A flame-colored butterfly gliding across a trail at the eucalyptus groves in Ellwood is the first clue to look overhead. Up toward the tops of the 100-foot-tall trees is where the monarchs cluster, on winter vacation after emerging from a chrysalis somewhere west of the Rocky Mountains.
Already, the count since October is nearly at 11,000 butterflies, a tally readily visible at the City of Goleta's GoletaButterflyGrove.org website. The trend is back up after the dismal tallies of 2018-2021, when a relative handful of butterflies were found at Ellwood.
Last year's butterfly total of more than 12,000 was dashed by the heavy January rains, said George Thomson, head of parks and open spaces for the city. And he's expecting a wetter-than-average El Niño this year, too.
