Today I led the first ever official butterfly walk at the Little River
Region Park and Natural Area (LIRI) just north of Durham, NC, then after
lunch we butterflied my yard a few miles from the park.
The time change last night made for a chilly and very windy start. Will
Cook and Greg Dodge were the only ones to show up, and Greg was actually
leaving the park with things to do. So Will and I started down the trail
leaving the brisk windy parking lot behind us, well mostly. Even though it
seemed to cold for butterflies we didn't get 100 yards down the trail and
the butterflies started showing up anglewings, duskywings and azures mostly.
We walked down the South River Trail and all along the Flat River it was
covered up in Spring Beauties and nectaring Falcate Orangetips. Just as we
got back up to the very windy parking lot, Roger Rittmaster called and we
met him and his wife Jeannie and two other naturalist friends Owen and
Mangus. We hooked up and checked the park a little more and headed over to
my estate.
My yard and neighborhood didn't fail us. We picked up several new species
and lots more dragonflies. I haven't seen the photo yet, but apparently
Jeannie photographed a Blue Corporal with 2 extra wings, one side had 4
wings the other side 2 wings, this was not 100 feet from where I'm typing
right now, I'll be keeping an eye open for it. I've never even heard of
such a thing.
Attempting to split the park by county as the lower half of the park is
Durham Co. and the upper half is Orange County. First Orange then Durham.
Here's the list,
10 30 Falcate Orangetip (Anthocharis midea) estimated numbers
1 0 Orange Sulphur (Colias eurytheme) my place
2 0 Henry`s Elfin (Callophrys henrici) both fresh in neighbors yard 3
photographers chasing
8 15 Edward's Spring Azure (Celastrina ladon) Will noted violet in everyone
we saw, my eyes (colorblind) couldn't notice much difference, but violet
was seen a lot. Still nothing is sure here.
0 1 American Snout (Libytheana carinenta) LIRI
1 0 Pearl Crescent (Phyciodes tharos) LIRI
1 3 Question Mark (Polygonia interrogationis)
3 3 Eastern Comma (Polygonia comma)
2 0 Mourning Cloak (Nymphalis antiopa) LIRI & my place
1 0 Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) my place
10 15 Juvenal's Duskywing (Erynnis juvenalis) perhaps more
and several missed anglewings as well as missed duskywings.
My plum tree was prime and the redbuds were close to prime, but it was too
windy for any butterflies in the trees. The only plants we saw being used
as nectar plants were Bittercress and Spring Beauty, both close to the
ground and out of the wind.
Odes finally!
1 0 Common Green Darner, Anax junius my place
4 1 Sely's Sundragon, Helocordulia selysii photos for all!
1 0 Uhler's Sundragon, Helocordulia uhleri a lifer for two of us.
1 0 Blue Corporal, Libellula deplanata Only Jeannie saw this one with 6
wings, didn't notice until reviewing the photo at home.
Couldn't beat the company we had a great trip no question.
Randy Emmitt
Rougemont, NC
www.rlephoto.com
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