That "Rain Shower" In California Was Actually A Bunch Of Ladybugs

The green blob on radar in southern California looks
like a rain shower, but it was a swarm of ladybugs

The other day, weather radar appeared to show a large, isolated rain shower moving southward from California's San Bernadino Mountains toward San Diego.

It was an odd looking shower, and not one that was forecast. As some of you might have heard, this wasn't a rain shower at all. It was ladybugs. Lots of them.

The ladybug swarm was about 80 miles in diameter, flying at elevations of between 5,000 and 9,000 feet above sea level. The most concentrated part of the swarm was about ten miles in diameter.

According to scientists, this weird "shower" of ladybugs is perfectly normal. As the Los Angeles Times wrote:

"In early spring, after temperatures reach 65 degrees, adult convergent lady beetles mate and migrate from the Sierra Nevada to valley areas where they eat aphids and lay eggs.

In the early summer, once the aphid numbers decline, beetles become hungry and migrate to higher elevations."

Weather spotters in the San Bernadino mountains said from the ground, the swarm didn't look remarkable. People did see "specks" flying by, which were individual ladybugs in the lower levels of the swarm heading south.

This isn't the only time bugs or other living things show up on radar. Expanding rings often show up on weather radar in and around Austin, Texas in the evenings. That's bats coming out of their roosts under bridges and such for evening meals.

Big mayfly hatches sometimes show up in the Midwest, too. As recently as May, swarms of midges appeared on radar near Cleveland.