Butterflies Form Massive Butterfly-Shaped Cloud Over St. Louis

A butterfly-shaped cloud—made of butterflies—was captured in colorful satellite images by St. Louis meteorologists.

by Beckett Mufson

September 23, 2014, 2:00pm

Images via

Last week, satellites over St. Louis picked up a strange and baffling image: a butterfly-shaped cloud morphing in unusual patterns. After a brief reflection analysis, local meteorologists realized that the phenomenon—which might have been easily mistaken for a glitch or a strange weather pattern—was actually a swarm of migrating monarch butterflies. The resulting satellite images are colorful snapshots of the butterfly-made-of-butterflies from above—it almost looks like they did it on purpose.

Citylab points out that "The last time that sort of radar coincidence happened may have been in 2011, when thousands of birds formed into a bird shape above Beebe, Arkansas, right before falling out of the sky, dead." While it's a strange phenomenon, it can only mean good things for the monarch butterfly, which hasn't been faring too well in the face of recent weather patterns. Hopefully the bugs fare better once they get to New Mexico, the projected destination of the butterfly-shaped cloud.