Swallows from the Moon
new study has shown that the Painted Lady butterfly makes a migratory journey of more than 6,000km (3,700 miles) to Africa each year. The study, from the University of Reading, found that the familiar British garden butterflies cross the Sahara Desert in the process, an impressive feat for an insect weighing no more than a paperclip. This is the longest insect migration yet discovered, beating the previous record held by the famed migration of Monarch butterflies between the US/Canada and Mexico. And there is much still to discover about the amazing seasonal voyages of seemingly humble creatures around us.
