(And yes--that's five different species all spotted TODAY, within a couple hours of each other.)

I'll throw salt over my shoulder for you and wish you good luck, too! I'm very wary of this warm weather - it was 70 degrees or more here today - because we'll surely have more cold spells. Hopefully, none will be severe enough to kill the butterfly eggs on both yours and my host plants - I've got gulf frit eggs on some of my passionvines.
I saw a gulf frit, a cloudless sulphur, a sleepy orange and a red admiral today.
Speaking of this weather - I remember somebody asking on another thread about how butterflies could nectar in winter. Well, I've been looking around, and, in addition to the narcissus that have already popped up and a few Carolina jessamine blossoms, there are dandelions blooming everywhere. I've monitored a particular dandelion by my fence for the past several weeks. When we had a cold spell with a light freeze about a week ago, the flower that was on it got killed back, but the rosette of leaves at the base didn't - they look sort of like turnip or collard greens, and they're apparently about as cold hardy. Well, now the same weed is blooming again, so if butterflies use these flowers for nectar, I think I can say they're reliable nectar plants during the winter. I've seen them using closely related dogbane flowers, so maybe they'll use the dandelions.
Good luck again, Laurellily!
Sherry

I have milkweed, lantanas, & one flame flower blooming. I also have Gulf Frits. Two I had from vines that keep getting leaves and the rest I brought home from Home Depot. I saw a sulpher today. I don't consider this the new season but last season still dragging on. I am waiting for everthing to freeze still. I also have dandlions blooming which I am not pulling up. Clover is also blooming. Last winter I saw sulphers off and on all winter during warm spells.I had sulpher cats in January last year. Eventually everything froze and died last year.

My Monarch and Gulf Frit cats are still going strong!

Thank you! :)

We had our first full frost (an inch or two of snow that lasted overnight) in early December. For me, that signals the end of last season.

The temperatures were very warm last week. We've got a freeze warning for tonight, though. I'm not sure what cats are in the yard but I hope they're ok.

It's pretty common here on the desert for various species to show themselves in small numbers off and on through out the winter months on warmer days. Might be any of the several species whose adults do winter-over just taking a spin around the neighborhood; might be a freshly emerged imago of a species that should have waited until spring to emerge; or it might even be a stray from far south that used a warming trend to migrate into your area by accident.

Here it is very common to see various Pieridae all winter long, mostly newly emerged imagos who just "woke up" too soon. They have little to no chance to survive and prosper. Next most common is the strays, the most interesting ones to me being the species that do not normally stray here even in season. For some reason few adults seem to over-winter here, yet when I lived in the deep snow country they were fairly common in my butterfly boxes.

With the corner turned on winter here, it won't be long until the early spring fliers are out in force (especially the Eucloe, Anthocharis and Pontia; Battus, some Papilio, etc). Some years the earliest species have flown, mated, laid eggs, and their larva have made it to the pupal stage by mid to late February (and they won't be seen again until next year).

i live in cypress (far northwest houston) and when i uncovered my meyer lemon friday afternoon, several swallowtails flew out of the tangle of sheets
the tree is about 4 ft tall and in full bloom and smells wonderful

most of my milkweed froze earlier in the week, but i still have about 4 blooming stalks- i hope they make it til something else blooms for the poor swallowtails
i'm wondering whether or not i should trim the butterfly weed down in the fall so the swallowtails won't hang around and get frozen!