Another trip to North Carolina netted a couple more lifers for Barry, Annette Allor and yours truly. We spent a wonderful weekend in the western part of the state namely Buncombe and Graham counties. The search for a Dusky Azure (C. niger) began much closer to home in MD and WV a couple of years ago but no reports of it were to be found and we looked more than once in possible places where the hostplant had been reported in the past. The host plant for Dusky Azure is (Aruncus dioicus), Goatsbeard. This apparently used to be more common in our area but possible over grazing by the deer population has not helped at all. It appears that this butterfly’s population has contracted into the southern Appalachians. We were successful finding 10-12 Dusky’s in a six hour search. The next day found us looking for one of the smaller duskywing species in the region, Mottled Duskywing (averaging the same size or a touch larger than Dreamy Duskywing). Other FOY’s on the trip for me were Red-banded and Gray Hairstreaks, Silvery Blue, Sachem and West Virginia White. I personally love going to the mountain areas for any reason; hiking, birds, etc. so this was a special trip with good company and decent weather.
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