Immersing yourself in the Butterflies Alive! exhibit at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History has become one of summer’s most joyful and colorful celebrations, made all the more special because wild butterflies are on the decline.
Recent research by experts from around the United States shows a 22 percent decline in the total abundance of butterflies across the country, looking at 554 species tracked between 2000 and 2020. Guests in the Museum’s Sprague Butterfly Pavilion however, are met with signs of life and optimism, and greeted by staff and volunteers who are eager to inspire understanding and conservation.
About 1,000 live butterflies from Costa Rica are being hosted this summer, explained Kim Zsembik, the Museum’s director of guest experience and lead butterfly wrangler, who has been directing the facility since 2018. “I have the best job in the whole world,” Zsembik told a small gathering of media and supporters on June 5. “I get to bring joy to people every day, and I think that’s really a core sub-mission of our institution, is to provide joy for everyone who comes, and to inspire a little curiosity and obviously exploring nature.”
Recently voted into the top three butterfly gardens in the nation by readers of U.S.A. Today, Zsembik said, “This pavilion is important in the regard that I think butterflies are this amazing gateway insect for a lot of our guests. So many of us are frightened of bugs and insects in the world; we’re taught to not get our hands dirty, to not touch, that it’s gonna bite you, and to just be really cautious. And I think this pavilion is meant to help inspire and bring comfort only in Santa Barbara and other places in the world, we have over two dozen different butterfly species, and that’s a really rare occasion that you’re going to find that you’re not going to find out in the wild.”
Those species currently include the blue-frosted banner (both male and female), blue morpho, Doris longwing, giant owl, giant swallowtail, Julia longwing, malachite, monarch, polydamas swallowtail, postman, silkmoth, tiger longwing, true cattleheart, and zebra longwing.
Although the butterflies that populate the exhibit are farm-raised, they engage in natural wild behaviors, so Sprague Butterfly Pavilion contains everything the two-dozen-plus species exhibited need to live comfortably.
“Our emergence chamber, it’s a wonderful place to explore, to see all of those species in their third stage of life, and that is a unique moment to witness nature and its different patterns and different textures, and to hopefully build some questions in ourselves and say like, ‘Wow, what is going on?’ And ‘How can I be a steward to this life cycle and to nature?’” said Zsembik.
A young visitor finds some friends at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History Sprague Butterfly Pavilion | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
A Tiger Longwing greets a visitor at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History Butterflies Alive! exhibit. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Writer Leslie Dinaberg releases a Tiger Longwing at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History Butterflies Alive! exhibit. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
A Giant Owl at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History Butterflies Alive! exhibit. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Inside the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History Butterflies Alive! exhibit. | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Kim Zsembik, the Museum’s director of guest experience and lead butterfly wrangler at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Tiger Longwings at the Butterflies Alive! exhibit | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Giant Owls find a snack at the Butterflies Alive! exhibit | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
A Blue-Frosted Banner at the Butterflies Alive! exhibit | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
A Postman at the Butterflies Alive! exhibit | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
The Butterflies Alive! exhibit | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
Tiger Longwings at the Butterflies Alive! exhibit | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom 
A Blue Morpho at the Butterflies Alive! exhibit | Photo: Ingrid Bostrom
She and her team have worked to create areas within the pavilion to mimic what the butterflies experience in the wild. “We don’t quite have the humidity of Costa Rica, but I like to try and create these little microclimates. … Seeing how the butterflies themselves actually use the space is interesting.”
She added, “Some species need flowers to feed on nectar, while others need rotting fruit. Males suck up minerals from mud puddles, for use in reproduction. And most of them roost — or rest — in the trees and shrubs here.” Seeing these behaviors up close makes it easier to visualize how butterfly populations have been affected by habitat loss, pesticides, and climate change.
Guests can come see Butterflies Alive! for themselves in the Sprague Butterfly Pavilion through September 1 at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. The pavilion requires $3 tickets in addition to museum admission; tickets are free for Members. See sbnature.org.
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