Your looks more like a West Coast Painted Lady instead of a Painted Lady due to the orange bar on the upper wing. Painted Ladies (Vanessa cardui) have a white bar on the upper wing.

West Coast Lady, Vanessa annabella
Identification: Upperside is orange-brown with an orange bar at the leading edge of the forewing; hindwing with 3 or 4 blue submarginal spots.

Painted Lady, Vanessa cardui
Upperside is orange-brown with darker wing bases; forewing with black apex patch and white bar on leading edge;

(more images of the Painted Lady)

runmede,

To quote my post...
"This V. carye was the first Vanessa I've seen this entire year."

Ladobe

Sorry, I guess I didn't read your sentence correctly.

This is what the Bug Guide says about V. carye:
"Synonyms and other taxonomic changes
Was known until 1971 as Vanessa carye. Typical V. carye is South American. The two are virtually identical, and differences are inconsistent and trivial. Opinions vary, and the distinction is debated, but it seems likely that V. annabella will eventually be lumped back into V. carye, or considered a subspecies of it. Our butterfly is sometimes listed under both names."

Here is a link that might be useful: Species Vanessa annabella - West Coast Lady

Yep, it helps to always read and understand before you get in a hurry to jump in with both feet. ;)

Traditional Lepidopterists' follow Vanessa carye. Very few of the many that I know have ever accepted 'annabella'.

So what is the definition of a traditional lepidopterist? Probably a serious old lepidopterist well past their prime who has been studying them for ever (like me who has done so worldwide for almost five decades). They are V. carye to me and I won't live long enough for anybody to prove otherwise to me. That especially includes not from on-line sites that usually follow simple field guides. IOW, don't trust everything you find about lepidoptera with your Internet searches - misinformation is very common and routinely passed on from site to site by the uninformed that author these sites.

FWIW

The BAMONA (Butterflies and Moths of North America) refers to it as V. annabella. This website is maintained by many old lepidopterist.

I think what confused me is your use of the V. carye, but through my searches on line and in books, I found out either is acceptable.

Art Shapiro's Butterfly Site, V. annabella. This guy for example is an old lepidopterist.

Here is a link that might be useful: BAMONA

The "Common Name to Scientific Name Look-Up List" in the FAQ section needs to be updated. Vanessa carye is not listed for West Coast Lady.

Here is a link that might be useful: Butterfly Common Name to Scientific Name Look-Up List

A far better "upgrade" to the FAQ would be a list by taxonomic names IMO. Common names are often localized, can be more confusing than helpful, especially to the hobby level folks here, and they can apply to a totally different lep or leps as well. A simple search of taxonomic names will usually lead you to any other taxonomic names also in use (past or present) for a particular bug, up to several common names associated with it, and often also list at least some of its subspecies and their ranges. But I doubt LG wants to give up his day job to have the time to do it since most here are not past common names anyway. Nothing wrong with that if that's as far as you want to take your knowledge.

There are several taxonomic names that this bug has been listed under, including the subgenera Cynthia (and maybe even Bassaris); annabella as a ssp of carye; carye as a ssp of annabella, etc. The circle of professional and serious amateur lepidopterists' I ran with used V. carye.

I'll behave and not tell you what I think of Bug Guide and BOMONA (a fair share of the data for BOMONA came from me).

I'm currently reading "Mariposa Road: The First Butterfly Big Year" by Robert Michael Pyle. It's good to know both taxonomic and common names.

Here is a link that might be useful: Review Seattle Times: 'Mariposa Road': Robert Michael Pyle's big butterfly year