butterflies
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Swallowtails
Mating Black Swallowtails. Papilio polyxenes. When I first saw this, I though it might be a hanging dead butterfly, all torn up from the vicissitudes. Always double-check the anomalies!Interestingly, this pair attracted another male, if not more than one over the ten to fifteen minutes I was there. (Black Swallowtails are all over.)The second male…
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Flower Fiends
Bumble/Tiger Swallowtail.A true bug, meaning an insect that sucks its food, and an unknown bee. Another bee I can’t identify.Don’t forget the butterflies, fools for flowers, too. One of the sulphurs, I’ve never been able to distinguish them.Whoa, Nelly! Look at the patterning on this Oblique Streaktail (Allograpta obliqua)! Going to work on getting a…
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Butterfly Madness Continued
Red-banded Hairstreak. This generally has a more southeastern range from the Carolinas down. They obviously can get further north, and presumably, as our temperature gets more southern, we’ll see them more often. Pearl Crescent. Another specimen with very frazzled wings.Common Sootywing.Eastern Tailed-blue.A rather more worn Eastern Tailed-blue. Female, I think. Small, rapid fliers, flashing blue…
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Butterfly Madness
Eastern Tiger Swallowtail. The hugeness of these is really telling when they’re at eye-level. Wingspan can reach 4.5″.Monarch.Black Swallowtails.Sulphurs courting.American Lady. Oops! This is a Painted Lady. I’m so used to seeing American Ladies, I didn’t even look closely at this photo. Thanks to Ken for pointing out the mis-identification.Common Buckeye pair.Red Admiral, very beat…
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RSP
Red-spotted Purple. Limenitis arthemis “in part” because the White Admiral of further north is considered the same species. They intergrade in-between ranges, and perhaps the ones seen locally are a little mixed? The formal binomial for the RSP is Limenitis arthemis astyanax (Fabricius)*.This beauty is rarely seen here. Its larval stage caterpillar is a bird-poop…
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Snoutless
Here’s what an American Snout, Libytheana carinenta, looks like normally. This one was spotted in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, near some particularly veteran hackberry trees. They lay their eggs on hackberries.Here’s another Snout spotted at Transmitter Park along the East River recently.It’s missing its “snout.” Actually, this appendage is not really a snout at all. These…
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Another Snout
This makes four American Snouts, Libytheana carinenta, I’ve seen so far this year in Brooklyn. That’s four times as many as I’ve ever seen. This one, unfortunately, was dead on the sidewalk.
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Question Marks
Polygonia interrogationis , the Question Mark butterfly. The wings need to be closed to see the mark in question. I think it’s more of a semi-colon. The similar Comma (Polygonia comma) has the “comma” mark but not the dot. Mud-puddling. Everyone does it, but butterflies are so conspicuous they get noticed doing it. Insects need…
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Insects Update
A couple of American Snouts. Um, yes, that’s their rather descriptive common name. Libytheana carinenta is a lot more common south and west — I’ve seen them before in Texas. Their larval food plant is hackberry. There were three mature hackberries above this understory. What an illustration of the relationship between plant and animal! I…
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More Insects
The Common Sootywing. The Kaufman guide says “flight is slow and close to the ground” but I beg to differ with the first characterization. This was about the tenth I’ve seen in various places before I could get a photo.Black Swallowtail, another mover, if not shaker.This is a Great Blue Skimmer, another case where the…
Backyard and Beyond 