Bugfolks

This is a post for those of you who are dreaming about spring.  Mike and I visited southern Texas at the end of January, and though it wasn't the best time for butterflies there, we saw lots of them - mostly species I had never seen before.  It was fun to see so many new species, and to see them in January!

These are butterflies from the NABA Butterfly Park in Mission, TX and several state parks in the Mission area. (I'll do another - smaller - post with species we saw in Big Bend National Park.)

This first one was the best butterfly of the trip - as large as a Tiger Swallowtail and brilliantly colored.   It's a Malachite - Siproeta stelenes

Crimson Patch - Chlosyne janais

The caterpillar of a Crimson Patch Butterfly

The caterpillar's food plant - Smallflower Wrightwort (Carlowrightia parvifolia)

Dusky Blue Groundstreak - Calycopis isobeon

Carolina Satyr - Hermeuptychia sosybius (Thanks to Dave Hanson for the ID)

Gulf Fritillary - Agraulis vanillae

Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak - Strymon bazochii

Top side of the Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak

Large Orange Sulphur - Phoebis agarithe

Laviana White Skipper - Heliopetes laviana

Mimosa Yellow - Eurema nise

Queen - Danaus gilippus

Mating Queens

Reakirt's Blue - Hemiargus isola

Texan Crescent - Phyciodes texana

Tropical Checkered Skipper - Pyrgus oileus

Common Checkered Skipper (Pyrgus communis)

Whirlabout - Polites vibex

White Peacock - Anartia jatrophae

There were several skippers that I couldn't identify - some that looked like dark grass skippers, and others that had long tails.

I saw one beautiful little moth - it's one of the wave moths - Idaea sp.

A Six-spotted Milkweed Bug - Oncopeltus sexmaculatus

American Snout

Empress Leilia

Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak - Strymon istapa

Monarch - Danaus plexippus
I didn't know any of them spent the winter in Texas.

Little Yellow (Pyrisitia lisa)

Phaon Crescent (Phyciodes phaon)

Southern Dogface (Zerene cesonia)

Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) - the most familiar butterfly I saw.

This is a Robber Fly (Efferia sp.) - a weird looking creature. It was sitting still in the sand - probably waiting for some prey to come along.

Marcie O'Connor

back in Buffalo County, Wisconsin

It's spring up here in Wisconsin - for the moment, anyway.  It was 65 degrees for two days in a row, and the overwintering butterflies have come out here at the farm.

This is the first one I saw - sunning itself on a patch of snow - an Eastern Comma.

and the first moth - The Infant - a bright colored day-flying moth whose caterpillars eat birch.

The next day I found 3 Mourning Cloaks battling over a small woodland opening - it seemed like they were having a territorial dispute.

Marcie O'Connor

Buffalo County, Wisconsin