Eugene Count 2026 Report

We had 21 people counting at our 4 traditional sites. Vanessa Best led a group to the South hills, Jim Mitchell led a group to the Mt. Pisgah Arboretum, Sue Anderson led a group to Buford Park East, and Rick Ahrens led a group to the West Eugene Wetlands. We also partnered with Nearby Nature again this year to count the Whilamut Natural Area, where Sharon and Jim Blick led a group of 3 Nearby Nature volunteers and 1 staff person. Also Lori counted independently at LCC and at the Buford Park Native Plant Nursery, Rick counted independently at Rasor Park, and we had one Garden Watcher in the River Road area. So our total was 27 counters, counting for a total of 20 party-hours.

We had record high numbers this year for 4 species: Great Copper, Gray Hairstreak, Common Checkered Skipper, and Orange Sulphur. This follows a trend from last year having pretty high numbers for two of these species: Gray Hairstreak and Common Checkered Skipper (but this species still doubled it’s previous record!) But our numbers this year for these other two species were much higher than last year: Great Copper was 3 times as high and Orange Sulfur was 46 times as high and beat the record by 100%. Last year we also had high numbers for California Sister (a record) and Echo Azure Blue, but this year only 7 California Sisters (versus 27 last year) and no Echo Azure Blues (versus 7 last year). Compared to last year, the Western Tiger Swallowtails are about 3 times as numerous. Mylitta Crescents went down by half. Common Ringlets are back up a bit, and Eastern Tailed Blues are twice as common as last year.

At our 4 traditional sites we counted 471 individuals of 18 species. Our average over the last 10 years is 320 individuals of 19 species. For our total count this year we had 512 individuals of 21 species. Counting at Wilamut, Rasor, and River Road (garden watcher) added 3 species. In only 2 of the past 10 years did we find more than 21 species.

Eugene Count 2026 – Summary (PDF)