Mariah’s slow sales

MARIAH Carey might want to sell some more jewelry if fans don’t start buying tickets to her “Butterfly Returns” shows at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas.

Seats are still available for the July 5 opening night of her three-month residency. “It’s a disaster,” one insider told me. “Scalpers bought a bunch of the tix and are freaking out.”

Carey (inset) fired her fiercely protective manager

Stella Bulochnikov in November and hasn’t performed since Christmas.

Bulochnikov was going to book her at a smaller venue in Vegas “so they could keep announcing sold-out shows,” my source said. “Instead, they put her back in Caesars with 4,300 seats.” Carey’s publicist told me, “These allegations are false and come from a source that must be desperate to pretend to be in the know . . . Look forward to seeing you at the Vegas show — if you can get a seat!” The publicist denied any cash-flow problems when I recently reported that Carey had sold her diamond engagement ring from James Packer for $2.1 million.

But people who were once in her orbit are concerned for her well-being, and don’t want her ending up like Whitney Houston and Michael Jackson.

Carey, who was hospitalized in 2001 after a nervous breakdown, revealed in April that she struggles with bipolar II disorder.

“Where is her knight in shining armor?” one source asked. Carey’s ex-husbands,

Tommy Mottola and Nick Cannon, couldn’t be reached for comment. LiveNation insists it’s “very pleased with ticket sales.”