I see oodles of butches all over the place and there is a huge community of queer here. I see them every day. They dress anywhere from tomboy to hippy to queer fashionista to outdoorsy looking les.
She may not be noticing many because like you may look like a soccar mom, they look like they are about to go for a hike and look tomboy androgenous lezzo in their gear. Some of the butches wear make up (and are stone and tops).
I live in the east end of vancouver, but that said there are tons of sporty butches in the burbs. she is probably mistaking them for chapstick/sporty dykes. just like you might get misjudged as a soccar mom.
tell her to get her ass to queer as funk, queer box fit, the butch choir, or one of the leather events. Plus there is the queer film festival, the the queer arts events (always brings them out in droves), season fling queer dances at the wise hall, Man Up (stuffed full of butches)... and... well to list everything I'd have to go into my fb events. If she needs to see them dressed up and in context
if she is talking about over a certain age (45 or so) yeah, they are thin on the ground. cause like everyone else, they usually have a partner/wife. Or they come from a time when it was really bad to have the ID. they still fuck the same and move the same and treat me the same, they just don't ID because they think it's wrong. But a rose by any other name is still one