After arriving in Monterey I met up with Chris Tenney, local butterfly researcher. One rainy Saturday we were talking and decided a new blog should be launched for our Northern California Lepidopterists. He helped me launch Northern & Central California Lepidopterists also a wordpress.com site. We are in the beginning stages of adding this summer’s counts, recent sightings and adding bloggers. Subscribe, share the link and contact me if you would like to contribute.
Visiting MPG Ranch
Life definately took a few left turns in the past few months or even close to year. I’m here in Monterey County. Still feeling a bit out of my element in a new location, even though I’ve lived here before. Looking through all the photos with Jeff at MPG Ranch last August, brings me back and makes me smile.
After a 10 hour drive to Florence just outside of Missoula I arrive to the amazing place that is MPG Ranch. It is a bit smoky from fires in the Bitterroot Valley, but that makes the sunset all the more dramatic.
With 3 houses on the property, I stayed with Jeff and a few others at the well appointed Top House. It has huge windows and the best views. The basement holds seed stock for habitat restoration, brewing the house hard cider and room for visiting researchers. We are adjacent to the garden growing fresh vegetables ripe for help yourself pick-and-cook. I knew right away, this is my kind of place.
Wild deer graze in view of the Top House.
Leave the porch light on for moths.
Below the house Alfalfa grows and the wild horses graze in the field scattered with sulfur and white butterflies.
We go out after dark to look for critters including Porwill birds. They fly quickly and burrow into the roads and logs, they blend in so look carefully. Reminds me of camping when my uncles would take us out hunting for Snipes. “Umm, Jeff, are these things imaginary?” They are as real as they come and as elusive as they sound. We did find some along with a herd of Elk, Great Horned Owl and a friendly Garter snake. The snake taming might be better left to Jeff.
Searching the habitat along the stream for Blues and Coppers.
Bald Eagle’s Nest at the stream.
Now Jeff is determined to make a birder out of me, so I spent some of our meals browsing the Audubon guide to North American Birds. I will admit I notice more birds now and can identify more of them too.
Taking off: A Mountain Bluebird and a shy brown bird (I didn’t learn everything in 3 days!)
Jeff arranged for us to take a river float in Missoula with some of the MPG workers, guests and dogs came too.
He was very dizzy and lightheaded here , but we made it down the chilly river. Have more beer Jeff!
If there are butterflies, we will and did find them. Northern Crescent at the launch spot.
Exploring Mount Baldy in the morning. We found amazing birds, a Wood Nymph and possibly the evolutionary origins of pack ratting. Makes me wonder why it isn’t called “pack birding”.
Traversing Willows at the marsh, mostly for birds. I decided to take a look for Viceroy caterpillars and we discovered a Tiger Moth Wooly Bear, beetle and toad.
Exploring trails for Lorquin’s Admirals, fritillaries, skippers and Meadowhawks. We brought a Lorquin and female Great Spangled Fritillary back for some photos.
Gracie
Horton
Turning logs for salamanders.
As we reviewed my plans for leaving Jeff tells me he’s going to the smaller facility, MPG North and I can learn transect surveys. Might be good to know and besides, I’m not nearly finished here. Plans changed – done.
Have you ever seen a Lepidopterist run like that Chasing Butterflies? Nevermind, shouldn’t have asked.
What an incredible few days. I really can’t thank Jeff enough for the experiences. This trip made my 2015 complete. In fact I’m so glad I put off writing this so I could relive the adventure. Here is to your next great season at MPG, Jeff.
Most photos by me Sara, all others Jeff Pippen.
White Colias Females
As usual, I was in Maine this year from late May through the end of the summer. In Maine late May is pretty much the beginning of butterfly season, and when I arrived it was unseasonably warm. So I immediately got out my net and went to see what I could find. What I found were some white butterflies which turned out to be Colias females. I assumed they were philodice, as they are much more common than eurytheme in the rural areas of Maine where I was. The interesting thing was that there were no yellow females flying with the white ones.
The white sulphurs petered out and the weather took a turn for the worse. It wasn’t till mid June that butterfly species began proliferating, including yellow sulphurs and cabbage whites. At this time, all the white butterflies I caught were cabbage whites. Any female Colias were yellow. Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t find another white Colias. I began to wonder about this.
Having lived in Maine most of my life, I had collected all the sulphurs and whites that seemed to be available (only three species of sulphur and two whites). I’d seen plenty of the white females, but had never noticed a time separation before. Now I wonder if I was missing something right in front of me. Or was 2015 just unusual? Or was it because I was only collecting in the small area near where I live?
Reading up on this subject from what is available on the internet, I learn that the alba female is more common in cooler areas, which certainly include inland Maine, and also that attention from whites (in Maine, primarily cabbage whites) and disfavor from yellow sulphur males are limiting factor in their reproduction. Maybe these factors explain the time difference I saw this year. Nevertheless, in 2016 I hope to spend more time looking into this.
Sidewalk Skippers
About two weeks ago I was walking in downtown Salt Lake when I noticed a couple of skippers on the sidewalk. Not having my net or binoculars with me, I couldn’t tell for sure what they were, but they were small tan skippers and might have been Polites sabuletti. The strange thing was that they were on the ground — walking. There were a male and a female in a courtship ritual — walking. In fact, the female actually walked backward when the male approached her. She did the usual wing fluttering, but just backed up away from him. He kept after her, as boys do, and finally after about 5 minutes of backing up she flew a foot or two away. He flew after her and they proceed to do their ground-based ritual again. At this point I had to get on my way, and as I passed both of them took off. So it wasn’t that they couldn’t fly. They just preferred not to, for some reason.
Using the sidewalk as a courting area seemed odd enough, but I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a butterfly back up before. Maybe they were ants in butterfly suits?
An Article Worth Sharing
An Overview of Moths
John Richards explains “Moths” with an overview of moths in the world and the difference between moths and butterflies.
Originally presented at the March 2015 meeting of The Utah Lepidopterists’ Society.
Powerpoint Download: Moths
Red Butte Canyon Lep Observations, First Day of Spring 2015
Since I couldn’t go caterpillar hunting with Todd today, I did the next best thing and ventured to Red Butte Canyon to see what might be going on there. As I don’t have a net, the plan was to look for larvae and/or eggs, not expecting to find much. At the very least I would have a nice walk. Continue reading
Monthly Meeting and 1st Field Trip
Monthly meeting will be held at the Museum of Natural History, 301 Wakara Way, Salt Lake City, UT
Presentation by ULS Member John Richards
And the first field trip of the season will be held immediately after for Colorado Hairstreak (Hypautotis chrysalus) eggs on the oak.
Neffs Canyon is located off I215 in the East Millcreek area
https://goo.gl/maps/0wSzW
A Trip to the Home Lab of Richard Whitten
On a trip to Idaho in 2012, Dr. Richard Whitten invited me into his home laboratory. I was just getting started photoing butterflies at the time. Continue reading
Labeling and Photography Meeting
Thanks for presenting Todd, and thanks everyone for attending.
Writings of The Utah Lepidopterists' Society 