Wow! What the heck was that? Then it came back again and Dave Hansen and Bill and Dottie were there just in time to get some more photos. This time is was very cooperative and everyone had great photo ops.
We talked about it a bit and all anyone could come up with was an aberrant Emerald Aguna. After a while I left for home and on the way Bill called and told me they had come of with an ID of Green Flasher Astraptes talus. At home I checked out Butterflies of America on line and sure enough the photos of Green Flasher looked just like our butterfly. There was even a photo from Ocampo in southern Tamualipas about 250 Miles to the south. For David and Jan Dauphin this was just another first US record found in their yard and yard butterfly #157. Pretty impressive!
I had started the morning over at John Rosford's house photographing the beautiful Ruby-spotted Swallowtails he had found the evening before. What wonderful creatures! John had seen four the night before and thought they may have hatched from his own yard where he has their host plant, lime prickly-ash.
At the National Butterfly Center interesting stuff included the continuing two Glazed Pellicias, Giant White, Purple-washed Skipper and Potrillo Skipper. A pretty darn good day!
