Wild Day Part II, Hairstreak-o-mania! 12/22/15

After Mark's call, I walked back to the car and proceeded to race the 19 miles to the National Butterfly Center hoping to see the Vicroy's Ministreak.  When I reached Hidalgo, I got another call.  Telea Hairstreak!!!  I had just missed one last week in the crotons at the NBC and had missed the one last year at Barry Nall's place that everyone else had seen and had missed the one at the Tanglewood coma a few weeks ago.  I was due!

When I arrived I was happy to find my butterfly friends guarding crotons and keeping an eye on the hairstreaks so picking up my life butterflies was a piece of cake.  First came the Telea Hairstreak.  What a tiny beautiful emerald!

And then it was the Vicroy's Ministreak.  This was previously thought of as a green eyed Gray Minstreak but was recently described as a new species.  Another tiny gem!

A Ruddy type hairstreak had also been found.  This one did not flash orange so we can't be sure if it's a female Ruddy (most likely) or a Muted (very rare).

And then another Strophius Hairstreak.  We had one just last month.

So that makes four pretty rare hairstreaks.  And then there were the more common ones, like this fabulous Great Purple Hairstreak.

And another green one, Silver-banded Hairstreak.

And the not-so-striking Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak.

And a sharp winter form Clytie Ministreak.

The very common Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak in its winter form.

And two for the price of one, Gray Hairstreak and Dusky-blue Groundstreak.

Yesterday's Gray Ministreak could not be found but we still finished with an amazing eleven species of hairstreaks.  That will be a tough record to break.  But it will be fun trying.

Strophius Hairstreak at NBC, 11/21/13

After a relatively dull day at the National Butterfly Center south of Mission, Honey and I decided to check the betony mistflower in front of the visitor's center one last time before leaving.  After a bit she asked "What's this little brown hairstreak?"  Well, after I got on it, I realized it was a Strophius Hairstreak, a pretty darn good bug for the Valley.  Luckily we were able to get a few people up to see it.

Otherwise it was a bit of  a weird day.  Numerous Giant Whites and at least ten Purple-washed Skippers were really unusual.  On the other hand, I was only able to dig out one Ocola Skipper.  Here's a lovely Giant White, another species I can't resist.

And here's a striking Purple-washed Skipper that was along the "wall" just north of Bentsen.

We had two or three Malachites.

And a beautiful Questionmark.

A few brief views of a strange haistreak got me all aflustered (Is that a word?).  But eventually it stayed put for a photo and proved to be just a sharp Clouded Skipper.

And lastly, here's a Hermes Skipper that could use a good shave.