Mimosa Yellow

About the Mimosa Yellow

The Mimosa Yellow is one of the little yellows of the South Texas brush - a small, bright lemon butterfly that bounces low along woodland edges and trails, rarely rising above knee height and rarely sitting still for long.

It is easily lumped with the abundant Little Yellow, and the separation is a classic South Texas exercise: the Mimosa Yellow shows a cleaner, less-marked underside and lacks the twin dark basal spots of its common cousin, and it favors shadier, brushier spots than the open-field Little Yellow.

As the name says, its caterpillars feed on mimosa - the sensitive-plants whose leaflets fold at a touch - which ties the butterfly to thickets and refuge trails where those plants sprawl.

In the U.S. this is essentially a Rio Grande Valley butterfly, flying most of the warm year in the Valley's woodlands, part of the supporting cast that makes South Texas the richest butterfly region in the country - well over 300 species have been recorded there, and patient photographers slowly collect them one small yellow at a time.