Turquoise Longtail at NBC, 11/29/25

Friday morning sharp eyed Ryan Rodriguez got a brief look at a rare Turquoise Longtail in the Mexican orchid by the nursery.  Thoughout the day hopeful butterfly watchers kept a vigil and eventually the Urbanus made another appearance.  Several people got diagnostic photos but I arrived too late.  I was taking a day off ahead of the warm windy Saturday that was forecast ahead of a incoming cold front.  It cost me a lifer.

So my plan was to spend Saturday looking for good stuff blown in on the southerly wind.  But before I could leave, the Discord sounded.  The Turquoise Longtail was back!  I raced over and got lucky this time.

 

This proved to be a fantastic day of very uncommon butterflies.  In the immediate area of the orchid tree Curve-winged Metalmark, Caballo (formerly Poterillo) Skipper and Giant and Great Southern Whites were reported.  Here's the metalmark.

Red-bordered pixies continue in large numbers.

Checking the nearby Coma tree, I spied a Marine Blue which put the NBC November list at an all time high of 139.

Then I decided to break from the crowd and run the bait logs.  Not much exciting.  So I decided to walk the ditch and found what I had hoped for... Malicious Skipper!  Well, I guess it's not called that anymore.  Synapte malitiosa as been split with the Caribbean nominate race retaining the old common moniker.  Ours is the Northern Faceted Skipper, Synapte pecta.  It's only the third I've ever seen, all self found.  I put it out on the alert but no one else was able to refind it.

Farther north on the bait logs I foud a couple of female Pavon Emperor's.

And then in the sunken garden Ken Wilson found me a male.

Good to see a couple of Fawn-spotted Skippers.  They were wiped out in the 2021 freeze.

Back to the south a Mazan's Scallopwing was reported in the little Gregg's Mistflower patch where the Red-spotted Patch was found a few days earlier.

Perusing the mistflowers I dug out an uncommon Erichson's White-skipper.

Back at the orchid tree, another Ruby-spotted Swallowtail put on a show.

Someone put a rare Spot-celled Sister on the Discord alert.  Was it misidentified?  All I found was a less rare female Silver Empror.

An uncommon Glazed Pellicia was on the blue Duranta.

A little later there was another report of a Spot-celled Sister.  I ran over expecting to see the female Silver Emperor but no, it was a beautiful Spot-celled Sister.  These used to be mega rare but we've had several this fall.

Ho hum.  Just another fantastic Malachite!

I ended the amazing day with a cavorting pair of Red Rims.  I saw aleast five on the day.

I guess the Northern Faceted Skipper pushed the park November list to 140.  I finished the day with 77 species.  

• Pipevine Swallowtail 2
• Giant Swallowtail 3
• Ruby-spotted Swallowtail 1
• Checkered White 2
• Great Southern White 1
• Giant White 6
• Orange Sulphur 1
• Cloudless Sulphur 1
• Large Orange Sulphur 20
• Lyside Sulphur 10
• Tailed Orange  1
• Little Yellow 6
• Mimosa Yellow 2
• Marius Hairstreak 1
• Silver-banded Hairstreak 2
• Gray Hairstreak 3
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 15
• Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak 15
• Dusky-blue Groundstreak 2
• Clytie Ministreak 1
• Western Pygmy-Blue 1
• Cassius Blue 6
• Marine Blue 1
• Ceraunus Blue 25
• Reakirt's Blue 1
• Fatal Metalmark 5
• Red-bordered Metalmark 1
• Red-bordered Pixie 20
• Curve-winged Metalmark 3
• American Snout 25
• Gulf Fritillary 5
• Zebra Heliconian 2
• Mexican Fritillary 15
• Theona Checkerspot 1
• Bordered Patch 6
• Texan Crescent 1
• Pale-banded Crescent 5
• Vesta Crescent 3
• Phaon Crescent 25
• Red Admiral 8
• Common Buckeye 5
• White Peacock 3
• Malachite 1
• Spot-celled Sister 1
• Common Mestra 8
• Red Rim 5
• Tropical Leafwing 3
• Empress Leilia 8
• Tawny Emperor 25
• Pavon Emperor 3
• Silver Emperor 1
• Monarch 1
• Queen 15
• Soldier 1
• White-striped Longtail 4
• Dorantes Longtail 1
• Brown Longtail 2
• Turquoise Longtail   1
• Coyote Cloudywing 1
• Glazed Pellicia 1
• Mazans Scallopwing 1
• White Checkered-Skipper 20
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 8
• Erichson's White-Skipper 1
• Laviana White-Skipper 25
• Malicious Skipper 1
• Fawn-spotted Skipper 2
• Clouded Skipper 20
• Southern Skipperling 3
• Fiery Skipper 3
• Whirlabout 3
• Southern Broken-Dash 6
• Sachem 2
• Common Mellana 10
• Eufala Skipper 15
• Olive-clouded Skipper 1
• Purple-washed Skipper 1

Red-spotted Patch at NBC, 11/25/25

I love serendipity.  There has been an adult Red-footed Booby at Corpus Christi this past week.  I see the reports daily on the Coastal Bend GroupMe app and on eBird alerts.  Already having seen the species in Texas, I've been slow to get up there.  But yesterday the bird which had normally been seen been sitting on a rock or marker at about 400 yards, was photographed much closer to the viewing area at the Corpus Christi Museum of Art parking lot.  That was enough to get me to move.  As the afternoon light is better, I got a leirsurely start and took off about 10am.

I had only gotten a hlf mile down the street when I realized I had forgotten something.  So I turned around and went back to the apartment.  Then I remembered I needed to make a dental appointment.  Done.  Now I was ready to leave.  I casually looked at my phone and saw a new post on the Discord butterfly alert.  I had the sound turned off so I almost missed it.  Stephanie had posted a photo of a butterfly just found by Omar, one of the grounds keepers at the National Butterfly Center.  "What is this?"  Yikes!  I instantly recognized it as a Red-spotted Patch and was the first to respond with the ID.  To hell with the Red-footed Booby.  This is a long wanted lifer butterfly!

I raced over and there was a small group circled around a patch of Gregg's mistflower by the conservatory in the back garden.  And there was the brilliant black, yellow and red butterfly.  The only previous record on iNat and BOA was from November 2006.  There may be older records that are hidden away in the lepidopterists journals.

Damn that was a sweet butterfly!  The discord sounded again.  "Rosita Patch in front of the visitor's center."  Some of us hopped in our cars and some started running back to the front.  I've only seen a couple of Rosita Patches and it was years ago.

Nearby was the common Bordered Patch.  The only ones missing are the once common Crimson Patch and the rare Banded Patch.  Bet we get em.

While we were watcing the Red-spotted Patch a small white butterfly visited.  It was another Barred Yellow, the third I've seen in three days.

After getting the Rosita Patch, Discord told us there was another Isabella Heliconian in the coma tree back by the Red-bordered Patch patch.  People started running back south.  It's only a few hundred yards but I hitched a ride with Billy.  Looks like it's the same one from three days ago.

It was getting close to noon and I had been invited to the annual National Butterfly Center Thanksgiving lunch so I hoofed it back north.  Nothing on the bait logs.  Stephanie and the crew put out an excellent traditional thanksgiving spread and the staff and visting butterfly watchers were invited.  It was damn good and I ate too much.  Afterwards I waddled around in the garden and found a second smaller Isabella Heliconian.

And a Zebra.

The Blue-eyed Sailor spent the whole day sucking a lantana fruit.  Must have been good.

Then word of a Telea Hairstreak back on the Isabella coma.  I drove back for the second time with Stefon hitching a ride both times.  We had met on an earlier butterfly festival trip.  I learned he was teaching discrete mathematics on the college level so we had stuff in common.  The Telea hairstreak was a little jewell.  I've seen a few through the years.

There were so many other uncommon butterflies around.  I'm sure I'm pretty close to a hundred species for the past two day.  The November list for the Natioal butterfly Center has heached and all time monthly high of 135 species.  We still have a few days to go.  Ho hum.  Here's another Red rim.

National Butterfly Center, 11/24/25

I was not going to go to the National Butterfly Center.  I wanted a rest day and had stuff to do.  So while the butterfliers were running around seeing stuff, I was accomplishing things.  I even got in a pretty good workout.  I was going to thaw out some chicken for a stir fry, but the damn butterfly watchers kept reporting stuff.  First the usual Malachites and Red Rims.  Then a Ruddy Hairstreak.  Then a White Scrub-Hairstreak.  Blue-eyed Sailor was the straw that broke the camel's back.  I've seen a few of those but if Blue-eyed Sailors are showing up, what else could be in the offing?  So I raced over to the National Butterfly Center and found the crowd focused on the Blue-eyed Sailor.  That was easy.

The first Julia I've seen in months took our attention from the sailor.

The Ruddy Hairstreak failed to show any orange on the topside that would designate it as a male Ruddy.  So it has to fall ito the Ruddy/Muted category.  Glassberg says it is not known how to ID Muted Hairstreak in the field.  This is most likely a female Ruddy Hairstreak.

Then we heard a distant call of "Pale-spotted Leafwing."  We started running, some of us faster than others.  I like the exotic shape of the fore wing.  It didn't stay long.

Red Rims are being seen daily.

Silver-banded Hairstreaks have become common.

And so many Clytie Ministreaks.

Then Terry found another White-scrub Hairstreak.

I later heard that the Indiana Gang had seen 100 butterfly species on the day.  Yikes.  This is turning into one of the best fall butterfly seasons ever in the RGV.  Good stuff is coming.