Butterflies In The Haze

 Glad I worked in the museum all day Thursday.  Wildfire smoke was thick.

Friday was still quite hazy when I got up.  The sun was desparately trying to shine through.

I went farther afield and ended up in Elgin County near Rodney.  I wanted to check out the sedges along Kerr Road where Dukes' Skippers reside.  I did not stay long, as mosquitoes were pretty intense.

I did find a couple of Dukes'.  The first one was in a difficult spot.

The other was in a better position to photograph.

A bonus was a Mulberry Wing, a small sedge skipper.

Northern Pearly-Eye and Appalachian Brown were here too.

I went home via Wardsville and stopped at the "Woods".  It was very disappointing!

Twelve-spotted Skimmer

I am just about "Dun" with that place.

Dun Skipper

At home later in the afternoon, two different swallowtails, both easterners, were in the garden.

Giant

Tiger

A Silver-spotted Skipper made a visit as well.

Saturday I went for a walk at Mitchell's Bay first thing.  Nothing of note, and after that I decided to stay indoors.  I worked at the Museum for a few hours!  I find it enjoyable accessioning artifacts where one logs all the information onto the computer as well as taking photographs of each item. Then you have to put the item in an appropriate location.  There is quite a backlog of artifacts to accession, so it will be an ongoing task.....

Today the weather was quite nice.  Good thing, as we did the annual butterfly count at Sydenham River Nature Reserve.  I did the Buttonwood side again this year.  

The dead-end road

We tallied 21 species.

The only thing in big numbers was Tawny Emperor.  There are lots of hackberry trees there, their main foodplant.

Pete and I saw only one Hackberry Emperor.

Quite a few Great-spangled Fritillaries too.

Northern Pearly-eyes were plentiful.

There was a handful of hairstreaks, but all were Banded.

There were not many odonates.  I did see a couple of Mocha Emeralds, but as usual for this year, they did not stop. 

Some views of the mighty Sydenham:

Some Swift River Cruisers were on the river.

I managed to photograph this Slender Spreadwing, the most common spreadwing, at one point.

On the way home, I swung by Reid C. L.  Nothing new.........just the usuals.

Dukes'

Noticed this at one point:

Laphria sericea

In the garden this afternoon, I caught sight of an Appalachian Brown.  Very worn, but it was a first for the yard!  Must have travelled some distance as these usually are around forest edges.

Next butterfly count is Clear Creek next Sunday.

Continuing With Insects!

 This past Sunday afternoon, a few of us checked out Reid C.L. for insects.  It was a perfect weather day--sunny and not too hot.

The theme was Dragonflies and Other Insects as I led a Lambton Wildlife outing.  Turnout was low with only three other people, so I guess other priorities were in order that day.

We had a wonderful time finding lots of things!

There were very few dragonflies, but we did see at least one Mocha Emerald on the wing.

We spent most of the time at the low spot where there was once a river channel.

Among the sedge skippers were Broad-winged, Dukes' and that single Dion.

Broad-winged

Dion

Dukes'

There were several baby tree frogs seen.

Some other insects:

Acanthocephala terminalis

Smeared Dagger

Short-lined Chocolate moth

Slender Spreadwing

Winthemia

Chokecherry Leafroller Moth

Carolina Grasshopper

A couple of Banded Hairstreaks were seen near the gate.

Next day, I wanted to go farther afield and ended up at Hillman Marsh and Point Pelee.  Things were scarce at Hillman, but several Broad-winged Skippers were around the shorebird cell.

An Eyed Brown was in a usual locale.

Dragonflies were extremely low in numbers.

Widow Skimmer

I went into Point Pelee for a brief walk down west beach trail.  The previous evening, a Striped Hairstreak was seen there.  I had no expectations of finding one, but I got lucky! Like finding a needle in a haystack, I just happened to spot a Striped Hairstreak.

Not all that common there, but I have seen a few many years ago.

No Common Checkered-Skippers were detected at Hillman which was very unusual.  However, that afternoon I found one in my yard.

Tuesday, I went up to Sarnia.  I needed to get a new cell phone (been putting that off too long!), but before that, I walked a portion of the Howard Watson trail between Modeland Road and Blackwell Sideroad.  I have found it good for insects in the past, but once again they were scarce (the trend this year).

One of my targets was to find Double-striped Bluet.  I managed to find one!

I also found only one Banded Hairstreak.

On the way home, I stopped at Moore WMA for a quick look.  Some Blue-tipped Dancers were along the river along with Stream Bluets.

Today, went just north of town first thing in the morning before the heat of the day arrived.  First walked Nicholl's Memorial Forest and Wetland.

Double-banded Grass Veneer moth

Then went to Reid C. L. and spent quite a bit of time there.  

I walked around the back field, and finally got a photo of a Royal River Cruiser for this year.

Along the main trail, I found quite a few hairstreaks.  More than last year and this year combined!  Most were Banded, but a few were Hickory.

Hickory

Banded

I spent most of the time at the "low spot".  

Lots of Broad-winged Skippers were flying.

A few Dukes' as well.

I did see a Mulberry Wing, but it never settled for a photo.  Second time I have seen one, but unable to photograph!

Few odonates.

Eastern Forktail

Slender Spreadwing

It was clear this morning, but as I write this, wildfire smoke is extremely thick here in Wallaceburg.  As bad as it was three years ago.  Hopefully it is better tomorrow.