East-Mexican Gemmed-Satyr, Fantastic Skipper at NBC, 12/23/25

Damn!  What a day!  

I didn't sleep well last night and wasn't sure what I was going to do today.  I finally decided I would just go to the Natioal Butterfly Center and look for Terry Mortier's Hoary Skipper.  It's been a few years since I've seen one.  Just as I was getting ready to leave the Discord bonged.  Terry had just found a Gemmed Satyr at the NBC.  Wow!  By Gemmed Satyr we mean Eastern Gemmed-Satyr.  I know Terry had seen a bunch of these in east Texas on his trip home to Wisconsin last summer.  There are a few RGV records.  I saw one years ago at Resaca de la Palma in Cameron County.  It would be a new species for my Hidalgo County list.

As I made the short drive over my mind speculated.  We are getting a lot of good butterflies from the south lately.  And there are other species of Gemmed-Satyr not far away in the mountains of Mexico.  Hmmm...  I parked and ran into the visitors center and ran out the back to the Hackberry Trail where I could see several people.  As I approched Terry said "You don't have to run.  It's just sitting there."  I quickly spotted the satyr eight feet away in the grass and fired a few shots.  Yup, I was right.  This was not an Eastern Gemmed-Satyr.  I told the group "I think we have a first US record."  More people showed up.  Stephanie came running with Glassberg's "Butterflies of Mexico".  

Discussion of the ID followed that continued on Discord, even into the night.  Glassberg says East-Mexican Gemmed-Satyr, Cyllopsis dospassosi, a species he predicted to occur in the RGV in an article in American Butterflies back in 2022.  But it does not have the strong dark blocking on the wing bands shown in his field guide.  But it has some.  Others were in the Cyllopsis nayarit camp.  And even Cyllopsis psuedopaphredo was getting votes.  Problem is these are all hard to identify, little known butterflies.  I posted on iNaturalist and Monterrey butterfly expert Ignacio Rodrigues agreed with dospassosi.  Needless to say this was another great lifer butterfly.

Meanwhile....  Normally rare Pavon Emperos were all over the place.  Ryan Rodriguez saw a dozen.  I saw seven.

This really bright female Pale-banded Crescent had me thinking about Black Crescent.

A Marius Hairstreak was ovipositing on Mexican Caesalpinnia.  They seem to not be too picky about host plants.

Then there was this hairstreak in the front garden.  I called it a Red-lined Scrub-Hairstreak and people were happy to see it.  But now I'm wondering if it's not the uber rare Bromiliad Scrub-Hairstreak.  All these rare butterflies have me suspicious of everything!

Curve-winged Metalmark?  This fall it's just a trash bug.

Then in the afternnoon I ran into botanist/birder Zach Johnson and we talked a bit.  A friend of his wandered up and casually mentioned there was was a Fantastic Skipper in front of the visitors center.  ????  "You shittin' me?"  He said that's what they're calling it.  I was by the big bird's nest at the time, a couple hundred yards away.  But I dug down deep and ran all the way, huffing and puffing by the time I got to the visitors center.  I ran through the building for the second time today.  Out front everyone was photographing something low by the duranta.

Fantastic Skipper is a butterfly I've been wanting to see for a long time.  Twenty years ago American Birding Association pioneer and birding guru Benton Basham got me into butterflies when he showed me a Mexican Silverspot at Santa Ana NWR.  (I already knew Benton from when I found him his lifer Crescent-chested Warbler in Patagonia, AZ a decade previously.)  I remember him showing me his business card which featured a photo of a Fantastic Skipper.  He had recently found the first record for the United States.  Maybe there's been one since then.  I don't know.  It's a first for the RGV on iNat.

Then there was another amazing Isabella Heliconian.  At least half a dozen for the park this year.

I made my way to the back garden one last time and finally found Terry's Hoary Skipper.

That's enough.  Two amazing lifer butterflies in one day!  And five this fall!  I don't think we're finished either.

Only 60 species today.

• Giant Swallowtail 1
• Checkered White 2
• Orange Sulphur 1
• Southern Dogface 2
• Large Orange Sulphur 5
• Lyside Sulphur 10
• Little Yellow 5
• Marius Hairstreak 1
• Silver-banded Hairstreak 3
• Gray Hairstreak 1
• Red-lined Scrub-Hairstreak 1
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 6
• Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak 4
• Dusky-blue Groundstreak 4
• Western Pygmy-Blue 2
• Cassius Blue 1
• Ceraunus Blue 10
• Reakirt's Blue 1
• Fatal Metalmark 2
• Red-bordered Pixie 5
• Curve-winged Metalmark 2
• American Snout 10
• Gulf Fritillary 5
• Isabella's Heliconian 1
• Zebra Heliconian 3
• Bordered Patch 2
• Elada Checkerspot 1
• Texan Crescent 8
• Pale-banded Crescent 3
• Phaon Crescent 6
• American Lady 1
• Red Admiral 8
• White Peacock 3
• Band-celled Sister 1
• Mexican Bluewing 1
• Common Mestra 1
• Red Rim 2
• Tropical Leafwing 2
• Empress Leilia 1
• Tawny Emperor 1
• Pavon Emperor 7
• Monarch 4
• Queen 40
• Soldier 1
• East-Mexican Gemmed-Satyr  1

• White-striped Longtail 2
• Brown Longtail 1
• Hoary Skipper 1
• Funereal Duskywing 2
• White Checkered-Skipper 5
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 5
• Laviana White-Skipper 8
• Clouded Skipper 6
• Fiery Skipper 3
• Southern Broken-Dash 4
• Common Mellana 3
• Eufala Skipper 5
• Purple-washed Skipper 5
• Fantastic Skipper   1
• Mexican Crescent 2

Dark Kite-Swallowtail at Old Hidalgo Pumphouse, 6/5/16

It was another trip to Santa Ana NWR this morning to look for the Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher.  I gave up after four hours and went home for lunch.  After eating I was thinking about a nap when I got the call from Bill Supulski that Tripp Davenport had just found a Dark Kite-Swallowtail at the Old Hidalgo Pumphouse. Someone sees one of these every few years down here but they only hang round a couple of minutes and then they're gone.   From our house it's 22 miles to the Pumphouse so I thought it was worth a shot.  I raced over and Tripp, Bill, Dot, Robin and Troy were still there and so was the swallowtail.  It only hung around a few minutes more but I was happy to get some shots as it nectared in a blooming fiddlewood.  I was excited and forgot to move my lense down to 300 mm from 400 so these photos are not the best.

Earlier in the morning after a couple of hours at the Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher vigil my birding discipline weakened and I wandered over to the butterfly garden on the other side of the visitors center.  One of the first butterflies I saw was a Hoary Skipper ovipositing on turk's-cap.  Joined by some of the other birders we soon found a couple more of them.

A blooming fiddlewood was really attracting the butterflies.  Over the next two hours I saw 35 species make a nectar stop.  Most made only a brief appearance this Ornythion Swallowtail

and two Giant Whites

and a Theona Checkerspot

and this Two-barred Flasher.

Mexican Bluewings don't show much interest in flower nectar.  They seem to prefer sap and ground salts.

A Guava Skipper checked out the blooming plumbago.

A couple of battling Great Southern Whites flew up over the roof of the visitors center.

Back at the fiddlewood were a couple more Hoary Skippers.

and my first Ocola Skipper for the year.

Here's my list from the butterfly gardens at Santa Ana NWR.

• Giant Swallowtail 1
• Ornythion Swallowtail 1
• Great Southern White 3
• Giant White 2
• Large Orange Sulphur 2
• Lyside Sulphur 2
• Mimosa Yellow 1
• Dainty Sulphur 1
• Gray Hairstreak 1
• Dusky-blue Groundstreak 5
• Clytie Ministreak 1
• Reakirt's Blue 1
• Red-bordered Metalmark 3
• American Snout 50
• Gulf Fritillary 1
• Zebra Heliconian 2
• Theona Checkerspot 1
• Bordered Patch 2
• Crimson Patch 1
• Texan Crescent 4
• Pale-banded Crescent 4
• Vesta Crescent 1
• White Peacock 1
• Mexican Bluewing 3
• Tawny Emperor 2
• Carolina Satyr `
• Guava Skipper 1
• Zilpa Longtail 1
• Brown Longtail 4
• Two-barred Flasher 1
• Coyote Cloudywing 1
• Hoary Skipper 3
• White-patched Skipper 1
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 4
• Laviana White-Skipper 2
• Turk's-cap White-Skipper 2
• Fawn-spotted Skipper 4
• Clouded Skipper 2
• Fiery Skipper 1
• Whirlabout 1
• Southern Broken-Dash 8
• Nysa Roadside-Skipper 1
• Celia's Roadside-Skipper 5
• Ocola Skipper 1

Hoary Skipper at Santa Ana NWR, 5-31-16

After having visited Santa Ana NWR each of the past three days for birds and butterflies, today I had to make it four days in a row after Javi Gonzalez found a fresh Hoary Skipper yesterday.  I spent nearly four hours looking for it, had given up and was leaving when guess what I found?  Only it wasn't Javi's Hoary.  It was a different one.  So with the beat up one he found a couple of weeks ago that makes three of this pretty rare bug at Santa Ana.  It was only the second one I have ever seen.

Three days ago I took a hot afternoon walk at Santa Ana hoping to find something good over there and I did.  This East-Mexican White-Skipper was on the tour road just past the canopy walk.

Other stuff I saw along the tour road included Common Mestra and Mimosa Skipper.

Then Sunday morning visiting birders found a Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher at the refuge so I ran over and failed to see it but did see this Two-barred Flasher.

There were at least a half dozen Pale-banded Crescents.

Yesterday I went back again to give the Sulphur-belly another shot when I found this Banded Peacock.

This is proving to be a good summer for Mexican Bluewing.  They have been hard to find the past couple of years.

Then today I went back for the Hoary Skipper.  While looking for it I found an ovipositing Brown-banded Skipper.  Barbados Cherry is the host plant.

After searching for a couple of hours, I walked up the tour road and checked out the Willow Lakes area.  A large number of the granjeno (spiny hackberry) bushes were completely stripped of leaves.  Upon closer inspection I discovered the culprits, American Snout caterpillars.

Walking back to the visitors center I found a Pearl Crescent which has been in short supply lately.

So here's a compound list from the past four visits to Santa Ana NWR.

• Giant Swallowtail 6
• Checkered White 1
• Great Southern White 8
• Cloudless Sulphur 2
• Large Orange Sulphur 8
• Lyside Sulphur 20
• Little Yellow 5
• Mimosa Yellow 5
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 1
• Dusky-blue Groundstreak 8
• Clytie Ministreak 15
• Western Pygmy-Blue 1
• Cassius Blue 4
• Reakirt's Blue 4
• Rounded Metalmark 3
• American Snout 50
• Gulf Fritillary 1
• Zebra Heliconian 2
• Mexican Fritillary 1
• Bordered Patch 3
• Elada Crescent 2
• Texan Crescent 8
• Pale-banded Crescent 6
• Phaon Crescent 5
• Pearl Crescent 1
• White Peacock 3
• Banded Peacock 1
• Red-spotted Admiral 1
• Mexican Bluewing 6
• Common Mestra 4
• Tawny Emperor 10
• Carolina Satyr 5
• Monarch 10
• White-striped Longtail 2
• Brown Longtail 6
• Two-barred Flasher 1
• Mimosa Skipper 3
• Mazans Scallopwing 1
• Hoary Skipper 1
• Brown-banded Skipper 1
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper15
• Laviana White-Skipper 20
• Turk's-cap White-Skipper 5
• Fawn-spotted Skipper 5
• Clouded Skipper 5
• Whirlabout 5
• Southern Broken-Dash 10
• Celia's Roadside-Skipper 10
• Eufala Skipper 3
• East Mexican White-Skipper 1