West Virginia Butterflies

Appalachian Grizzled Skipper

Posted on April 19, 2015 by admin

It was a perfect day for looking for butterflies in the highlands of Alleghany and Botetourt counties Virginia. Eight lepsters took Mike Smith up on his offer to look for one of the rarest skippers in the region, the Appalachian Grizzled Skipper. Once it was more comon in the high country of our region before persistent spraying for Mosquitos and Gypsy Moths over the last few decades has decimated the species. Dwarf cinqefoil is the host plant for tis species in our area. It is considered threatened and classified as endangered in Ohio and New Jersey.

With many educated eyes scanning the habitats 21 species were seen for the day including 20+ Elfins. Henry’s Elfin, Brown Elfin and Eastern Pine Elfin graced the binoculars. It’s always great to see these erratic flying “triangles”. I saw eleven first of year (FOY) species which included Silver-spotted Skipper, Pipevine Swallowtail and Juniper Hairstreak. It looks as though this was to be the last warm day for the next 10 days or more as the forecast is for temps to be around 60 with periods of rain. The counts shown below are my own. The aggregate group totals were more.

* = FOY
** = Lifer

 *Silver-spotted Skipper         1
 *Dreamy Duskywing               2
  Sleepy Duskywing              75+
  Juvenal's Duskywing           24
**Appalachian Grizzled Skipper   8
 *Pipevine Swallowtail           8
  Zebra Swallowtail             10
  Eastern Tiger Swallowtail     12
 *Spicebush Swallowtail          1
  Falcate Orangetip             11
  Cabbage White                  2
 *Clouded Sulphur                2
  Orange Sulphur                 1
 *Juniper Hairstreak             2
 *Brown Elfin                    3
 *Henry's Elfin                  6
 *Eastern Pine Elfin             7
 *Eastern Tailed-Blue           20
  Spring Azure (C. ladon)        7
  Silvery Blue                  11
  Eastern Comma                  1

  Lady sp.                       1

Click on any image below to enlarge

Posted in Blues, Brush-footed, Duskywings, Remote Trip, Skippers, Swallowtails | Leave a comment

Found my Marbles!

Posted on April 12, 2015 by admin

Despite a cool breeze and temps not getting above 60 it was sunny enough to get things moving as Barry Marts and I started around 12:30 pm. It didn’t take long before the first Sleepy Duskywing (2) of the season took off out of the grass. After only 20 minutes or so of searching we found a very fresh female Falcate Orangetip with its diagnostic pointed forewing trying to warm up. About three minutes later a male Olympia Marble went flying by but soon landed to nector. It was a yea! moment as this is a species I’ve been wanting to see ever since I got into butterflies a few years ago. It’s one of those species you see when leafing through the field guides and say “I really would like to see one someday” much like I said about the Bluethroat of the birding world. Since we are still in the early stages of things that actually worked to our advantage and gave us less options to sort through (as oppossed to a jillion Orangetips with a hand full of Marbles a week from now). The counts were very even today, 7-6 in favor of the Orangetips. The cooler weather helped out too as the butterflies were actually sitting down to warm up or nector. After an hour or so of watching them fly back and forth we got it right most of the time when calling out a Marble on the wing. The upperside of the forewing towards the apex has additional dark markings when compared to the Orangetips and this gives the Marbles a little duskier look. In addition, we saw many FOY Spring Azures (C. ladon)(20+) of several of which were of the “margined” form, not to be confused with the “marginated” form of C. lucia. These terms sometimes get applied to the wrong species. Rounding out the cast were Mourning Cloaks (4) and (5 ) anglewing sp. Flowers were everywhere ranging from tiny mustards to Coltsfoot, Bloodroot, Spring Beauty, Dutchman’s Breeches, Cutleaf Toothwort and Beaked Trout Lilly. A great three hours in the field.

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Posted in Blues, Butterfly ID, Remote Trip, Whites and Sulphurs | Leave a comment

“Spring Brood” Summer Azure – Shannondale Springs WMA

Posted on April 3, 2015 by admin

Shadow and I went for a slow walk this afternoon in Shannondale Springs WMA. This is located in Jefferson county. It was a nice break from work which has been hectic as of late. The first full bloom patches of Bloodroot where seen. Also seen were the first Azures of spring. As most butterflyers know the Spring Azure complex can be just that, complex but thanks to many individuals including David M. Wright and Harry Pavulaan (who has taken his time via email coorespondence to help educate this lepster on these species) we have begun to unravel and find out more about what was once though to be “Spring Azure” only. Indeed, during much of the spring there is overlap with the various Azure flight periods. However, depending on where you are, the habitat and time of year you can get some idea of what species to expect. Learning the species “hosts” helps a lot. Last year I presented a time table for the Celastrina species in our area: Celastrina Time Table.

You can find more in depth articles by David and Harry here.

Rick Borchelt also has some nice Azure articles on his Lep Log here and ID help here.

I found 4 “Spring Brood” Summer Azures (Celastrina neglecta) along with 4 cooperative Eastern Commas and 3 Mourning Cloaks today. Finally, a sign of things to come. Are you ready?

Posted in Blues | Leave a comment

South Florida – Redux

Posted on March 25, 2015 by admin

I spent another long weekend in southern Florida in a fruitless search for the Key West Quail-Doves that have been seen in Long Key State Park since last fall. So, the backup plan was to seek out some butterflies and hopefully pick up a few south Florida specialties. Diveristy is not great until later in the spring but the year round residents offer much reward. It was partly to mostly sunny with temps pushing 90 degrees each day. I visited the following locations over the course of three days:

Navy Wells Nature Preserve near Florida City
Everglades National Park (Pinelands and Flamingo)
Tree Tops county Park in Davies, FL
Burt Aaronson county Park (Ruddy Daggerwing Nature Center west of Boca Raton, FL)
Mounts Botanical Gardens (West Palm Beach)

Each location held the prospect of a south Florida specialty or two. I managed to find 34 species and 8 of those were lifers so it was well worth the effort. I would recommend however that for peak diversity that you visit during May-June and August (during the cool weather(:> ). Florida Duskywing, Three-spotted Skipper, Baracoa Skipper, Obscure Skipper, Martial Scrub-Hairstreak, Bartram’s Scrub-Hairstreak, Ruddy Daggerwing and Malachite headline the list. I got photos of all the lifers (shown below) except for Bartram’s-Scrub Hairstreak which would not stay still long enough for a photo. I’ve also included a couple of extra images. The Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak is the south Florida specific sub-species (Strymon istapa modesta)

Click on any image below to enlarge

Posted in Brush-footed, Duskywings, Gossamer-winged, Remote Trip, Skippers, Swallowtails | Leave a comment

South Florida

Posted on January 13, 2015 by admin

I spent a long weekend in southern Florida bird watching but managed to get in a couple hours for butterflies. Although it’s not the best time of year for diversity there are species that do fly year round (Don’t we wish). All of these were seen at Flamingo, FL in Everglages National Park which hosts an outstanding variety of mammals, reptiles, birds and insects. New state butterflies like Great Southern White (You have to love those turquoise antennal clubs), Ceraunus Blue, Gulf Fritillary and Long-tailed Skipper where not hard to find as this was my first sortie for leps in Florida. I also added four lifers: Barred Yellow, Eastern Pygmy-Blue, Mangrove Buckeye and Monk Skipper. I’m sure I’ll be back during peak season sometime in the future. Temperatures in the 70’s and lower 80’s were soooo hard to take(:>

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