The Misery

The first Sunday in July is always the Skunk's Misery butterfly count.  It is one of the better counts and I always participate.  We meet at the Newbury hospital and spread out from there doing the roads in the "Misery", or sometimes called Mosa Forest.
I do not know the exact origin of the term Skunk's Misery, but it goes way back to the early 1800's and is well known.  It was always considered a large, dense swampy forest infested with mosquitoes. There is reference to it in the Baldoon Mystery story ( a story, whether fact or fiction, of witchcraft plaguing early settlers in the Wallaceburg area c. 1830). (another story....)

We know it today as a place of extensive forest that uncommon birds such as Cerulean Warbler, Hooded Warbler and Acadian Flycatcher among others inhabit.
As well, it is an excellent place for butterflies.
On Sunday, I took the west end of Centreville Road and walked east towards Dogwood Road.  It is a good  spot.  As counters were few this year, Maris Apse and I did this section ourselves.  We came up with about 25 species of butterflies in 3 hours on that section of road.  Our best species was Variegated Fritillary (2).

As well, one always looks for other things such as birds, plants or dragonflies.  We heard several Hooded Warblers, and I got a glimpse of one as I walked into the forest.  Later on, a male Cerulean Warbler was constantly singing.  Down the road while I was pishing for something,  a female Cerulean Warbler came out right in front of me (not what I expected!).  Unfortunately I did not have a camera since I usually don't carry one doing a count.  This always works to the advantage of seeing something good.  Back in 2008, we found a Green Comma on the same road--perhaps a first record for Middlesex.
Just before getting the Cerulean, I spotted a dragonfly which I did not readily recognize.  I took some notes to look at later.  Turns out it was a mature female Great Blue Skimmer.  A species I have never noted and they are quite rare in Ontario.  James Holdsworth indicated that there is no known Middlessex record, but in 2007 there was an incursion in which he and Dave Martin saw one at Clearville ( a place in the news recently for some strange reason!).  As well James saw one near Bickford Oak Woods south of Sarnia that year and some in Oxford County.  There are records for Essex as well.
The field marks were easy to note, so it did not take long for me to figure out what this large dragonfly was.

After lunch, I joined up with Stan Caveney and Chris Leys and his wife to do areas north west of Newbury. We found some good spots.  Our first spot was one I recognized from back in the 1990's when we went to the area in late May or early June to look for uncommon birds.  It was one of those areas you had to wear tall boots and put on loads of insect repellent, but it was fun!
As tradition holds, a BBQ was held late in the day at the Prieksaitis farm.  Total species count was 53 I believe.  Nothing too outstanding, but Dun and Northern Broken Dash were in huge record-breaking numbers.  Harvester was once again found on this count by the Pye's.  Two years ago we had one on Trillium Road.
Some recent photos:

(Don't bite off more than you can swallow!)

A rusty gull at the Tip of Pelee

Dion or Dukes'?

Lots of Buckeyes on the Skunk's Count.  In fact record high I think.