Quinta Mazatlan, 10/29/24

An impromtu run over to Quinta Mazatlan turned into a pretty darn good butterfly day.  The private garden just outside the entrance gave up its usual Mexican Fritillary.

The crucita by the entrace to the beautiful old visitor's center hosted a worn Julia.  It is often called the Julia Heliconian but it is not a Heliconius.

After checking in I hit the little garden just outside and things started getting good.  I have never seen so many Pale-banded Crescents.  They have been hard to find this year.

A male Red-borded Metalmark showed off his scarlet underwings.

Then I found a good one.  This is the first Potrillo Skipper I have seen this year.  The usual spot at the Old Cemetery at Santa Ana NWR has failed to produce any.  Nick Grishin's new name is Caballo Skipper.  Hard to keep up with all the new splits from the recent DNA work.  

And then a Giant White made a brief appearance.

I checked the plumbago patch where the Mexican Violetear hung out a few years ago and found this sharp Two-barred Flasher.  Nick Grishin has split this one off and is calling it Qian's Flasher.

Lots of Mourful Duskywings around, each one different.

A walk back to the Ebony Grove Turned up a massive patch of crucita.  McAllen had some heavy rain in August that other local spots missed.  Here I found both Long-tailed Skipper and Brown Longtail.

Good grass skipper diversity nectaring on the crucita.  Here are Ocola, Sachem and Fiery Skippers.

A return to the little garden by the visitors center gave me my best butterfly.  Curve-winged Metalmark has been nonexistent in the RGV this year.

One last loop around the park turned up a Silver-banded Hairstreaak.

Finally, after seeing a half dozen during the day, I got a decent Zebra Heliconian shot back at the private garden where I started.  This really is a Heliconius (for now) but some call it the Zebra Longwing.  In the birding world, The American Ornithological Society does a good job of keeping bird names uniform in the New World.  But lepidopterists are a petty, divided bunch with a frustrating lack of uniformity in common names and even species recognition.  Oh well.....

Here's today list of 44 species

• Pipevine Swallowtail 1
• Giant Swallowtail 6
• Giant White 1
• Southern Dogface 1
• Cloudless Sulphur 3
• Large Orange Sulphur 6
• Lyside Sulphur 1
• Little Yellow 3
• Silver-banded Hairstreak 1
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 2
• Cassius Blue 1
• Red-bordered Metalmark 2
• Red-bordered Pixie 1
• Curve-winged Metalmark 1
• American Snout 1
• Gulf Fritillary 1
• Julia Heliconian 1
• Zebra Heliconian 5
• Mexican Fritillary 1
• Bordered Patch 3
• Texan Crescent 1
• Pale-banded Crescent 25
• Vesta Crescent 1
• Pearl Crescent 1
• White Peacock 5
• Mexican Bluewing 1
• Common Mestra 4
• Tawny Emperor 2
• Queen 5
• Long-tailed Skipper 1
• Brown Longtail 2
• Two-barred Flasher 1
• Potrillo Skipper 2
• Sickle-winged Skipper 8
• Mournful Duskywing 8
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 2
• Laviana White-Skipper 4
• Clouded Skipper 3
• Fiery Skipper 15
• Whirlabout 2
• Sachem 5
• Eufala Skipper 3
• Ocola Skipper 6
• Purple-washed Skipper 1