Rockport Lifers, 11/7/25

There are still plenty of butterfly species I have not seen in the great nation of Texas.  One of my goals this year was to run up to the Coastal Bend and look for False Duskywing.  We are supposed to get them in the Rio Grande Valley but I've never seen one.  Enter Craig Robson.  This past spring I had the chance to meet Craig and his lovely wife at the National Butterfly Center and even got them a lifer Angled Leafwing.  At the time I thought his name sounded familiar.  Later I realized he was the author of Birds of Southeast Asia and many articles I had read in the Oriental Birding Club publication Birding Asia.  He had recently entered a records into iNaturalist of False Duskywing and Salt Marsh Skipper from the Rockport Area.

After an uneventful day butterflywise yesterday, I decided to run up to Rockport.  I would still have Saturday to look for butterflies before the approaching cold front.  I arrived at the Linda Castro Wildlife Area about 10 am and started working the flowers.  Plenty of butterflies but northing noteworthy  A sit at one of the drips turned up a late Tennessee Warbler.

Best butterfly was a White-striped Longtail.

After lunch I did another round of the trails.  Here's a nice Pipevine Swallowtail.

This was the best spot for False Duskywing on the Coastal Bend and I was coming up empty.  I was going to give it a few more minutes and then go to the Salt Marsh Skipper spot when I got a brief glympse of what looked to be a small spreadwing skipper.  It was a beat up False Duskywing.

Now I headed to the Cove Harbor trail just south of Rockport for Salt Marsh Skipper.  I arrived to find a boardwalk runing into the marsh.  But nearby flowers by a brushy spot attracted my attention.  I checked them out and quickly found a little golden Panoquina.  "Wow that was easy" I thought.  I fired a few shots but was disappointed when I looked at the images.  It was a Panoquina alright, but the spots were wrong. One dot and a space and two more dots.... it was a darn Obsure Skipper like we have on the salt marshes of Cameron County.

I found several more but not the Salt Marsh skipper.  Maybe they like it wetter.  So I walked the muddy edges and only saw more Obscure Skippers.  I walked back over to the flowers thinking I might have to walk the boardwalk.  One more skipper landed on a betony mist flower and this time the spot was right.  I got my lifer Salt Marsh Skipper.

It was nice to get these two lifer skippers that I had nelected for so long.   On my way home the Discord app sounded.  Terry Mortier and Chris Balboni had just found a strange long tailed skipper along the Retama Wall.  ID was being debated but consensus quickly settled on Eight-spotted Skippper.  That's one I've wanted to see for a long time.  But no one else saw it.  Something to do tomorrow!

Texas Butterfly Festival. 11/5-7/17

The past few days I have been leading field trips for the 2017 Texas Butterfly Festival at the National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas.  I don't know the cause, but as far as rare butterflies are concerned, this has been the best of the past five festivals in which I have participated.  Things started on Saturday afternoon when guides and participants started findings some pretty rare butterflies.  Best was the fourth US record of Shadowed Hairstreak found at Retama Village just north of Bentsen State Park.  This was followed by about another ten or more of the same species found along the Retama Village wall.

In the process of searching along the wall, Robin Zurovec found this cool Telea Hairstreak.

And we all saw plenty of gray-eyed Marius Hairstreaks.

Sunday morning I took a small group out to Cameron County to check some hot spots.  Resaca de la Palma turned up the usual specialties like Blue Metalmark, Boisduval's Yellow and Band-celled Sister.

Then it was on to the the infamous Smiley Face where Xami Hairstreaks flew from under out feet as we walked the track north.  We saw at least a dozen.

We also got the aptly named Obscure Skipper.

I could not get the group to go down to the end of the track whee I had found Saltbush Sootywings a couple of days earlier.

And finally some digging through the tall grass along the highway turned up a Pale-rayed Skipper.

The next day I led the trip to Weslaco where out Progreso Lakes yard thrilled the group with Red-bordered Pixie and Guava Skipper.  Frontera Audubon Thicket and Estero Llano Grande State Park had butterflies but nothing outstanding.  Meanwhile good stuff like Smudged Hairstreak and Mercurial Skipper were being seen by other groups.  

I had no trip scheduled for Tuesday, so I just hung around our yard while others led Festival trips.  I was getting ready to take a nap when I got a text from Linda Cooper that Martin Reid had just found an Orange Banner at the National Butterfly Center, a fourth US record.  So I raced over and no one had seen it since.  But I got a rare Pale-spotted Leafwing to show a bit of the upper wing so that made the trip worthwhile.

And then there this really sharp Guatemalan Cracker.

And of course everyone enjoyed the Malachites.

And just as I was leaving the NBC, people looking along the "wall" had found a Four-spotted Sailor.

Well this old birder had had enough of butterflies for a while and just rested today to get ready for the Rio Grande Birding Festival  Meanwhile back at the NBC, a Common Banner was found and thrilled the hardcore butterfliers that remained.  What a productive butterfly festival!

Cameron County, 10-14-15

Yesterday I ran over to Cameron County to scout for a field trip for the Texas Butterfly Festival.  Cameron County has a half dozen species that are really difficult to find in Hidalgo County where the National Butterfly Center is located.  My first stop was Palo Alto National Battlefield which is home to a population of Definite Patch.  I didn't find any so I had to settle for this magnificent Blue Metalmark.

Saw an Ocola Skipper and a nice Sachem.

And an inquisitive Long-tailed Weasel.

Next stop was Sabal Palm Sanctuary where I could not find Double-dotted Skipper which is not a surprise as it is more of a spring bug.  Infact there were only a few skippers and not much in bloom.  This female Rufous Hummingbird was the highlight.

Finally I ran out to the TX 4 Smiley Face to look the "big four".  First was an Obscure Skipper.

Pale-rayed Skipper was not too difficult either.

But I could not dig out Xami Hairstreak or Saltbush Sootywing, so I only scored 50% on the Cameron County Specialties (not counting the Resaca de la Palma specialties).  Guess I need to scout some more.

Boca Chica area, 7/23/13

Yesterday Mike Rickard and I took my truck over to the mangroves of Boca Chica near the mouth of the Rio Grande in search of Mangrove Buckeyes.  We found a large patch along the river and sure enough Mike dug out a pink Mangrove Buckeye but wasn't able to get a photo and I didn't see one at all.  So in consolation here's a photo from the same spot from 8/30/11 which may or may not be a Mangrove.

We did see Obscure Skippers but they were unusually uncooperative.

Due to excessive mud I wasn't able to get further down the river so we checked out the mangroves just before the dunes on TX 4.  A couple of buckeyes teased us but turned out to be dark Tropical Buckeyes.

On the way back we checked out "the smiley face" for Pale-rayed Skippers and Saltbush Sootywings.  We struck out.  But a bit bit down the road Mike saw some likely looking saltbush plants and expertly flushed out a Saltbush Sootywing.

A couple of days earlier I helped out with the National Butterfly Center's butterfly count.  I heard we finished with 65 species which isn't bad for late July.  Best were the several Ornythion Swallowtails and a Dark Kite-Swallowtail.  Unfortunately I left too early.  But I did get to see several Dingy Purplewings.

This ovipositing Brown-banded Skipper was a treat.