Mexican Crescent at NBC, 10/12/25

A weak cool front came through and dropped the morning low to below 70 for the first time since spring.  With clear sky and lower humidity I decided to check out the National Butterfly Center.  Turned out to be a good choice.  Butterfly of the day goes to this worn Mexican Crescent.  I've been checking the Phaons lately as we were invaded by Mexican Crescents last year in October.  Previously they had been extremely rare.

The esperanza was suddenly filled with Doube-dotted Skippers.

A big Brazilian Skipper zoomed in for a sip.

A big dark skipper burried itself in an esperanza flower.  What the hell is this?

Could it be a Guava Skipper?  Can they show a tail?  It zoomed out and did not reappear so I went to the Mexican Orchid and sure enough there was a Guava Skipper.  And yes it has a bit of a stub stail on the hind wings.

Between the Tropical Milkweeds Gregg's Mistflower and Crucita there were well over 200 Queens.

It was a good day for White-patched Skippers.

It's been a while since we've had a Hackerberry Emperor.

A Giant White hit the Mexican Olives.

My first Monarch of the fall.

Last butterfluy of the day was this very fresh Texas Powdered-Skipper.

38 species on the day without any south wind.  The crucita is getting ready to pop.  Good times ahead!

• Pipevine Swallowtail 1
• Giant Swallowtail 6
• Gray Hairstreak 2
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 1
• Ceraunus Blue 12
• Fatal Metalmark 2
• American Snout 10
• Bordered Patch 6
• Phaon Crescent 20
• Painted Lady 1
• White Peacock 2
• Mexican Bluewing 1
• Tropical Leafwing 6
• Hackberry Emperor 2
• Empress Leilia 3
• Tawny Emperor 12
• Monarch 1
• Queen 200
• Guava Skipper 1
• White-striped Longtail 2
• Dorantes Longtail 1
• Brown Longtail 1
• Texas Powdered-Skipper 1
• Sickle-winged Skipper 3
• White-patched Skipper 5
• White Checkered-Skipper 5
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 15
• Laviana White-Skipper 10
• Clouded Skipper 20
• Double-dotted Skipper 6
• Southern Skipperling 3
• Fiery Skipper 15
• Southern Broken-Dash 1
• Common Mellana 2
• Celia's Roadside-Skipper 8
• Eufala Skipper 12
• Brazilian Skipper 1
• Mexican Crescent 1

National Butterfly Center, 8/16/25

It's still hot and nasty in the Rio Grande Valley of south Texas but there's a hint of fall in the air.  Maybe it's just the days getting a little shorter.  The Mid Valley got rained on hard by a weird little low pressure system that spun up in the Gulf so I ran over to the National Butterfly Center yesterday to see what was going on.  They got very little rain but there were still plenty of butterflies.  Star of the day was this stonking Brown-banded Skipper.  It was so strongly marked it had me scratching my head a bit.  It's been a couple of years since I have seen one.

There was a nice White-patched Skipper in the in front of the visitors center.

I like spread winged skippers.  But sometimes I get tired of of Sickle-winged Skippers when they are so common.  But lately they have been uncommon so this one was appreciated.

All of the tailed skippers were missing tails.  I think they have blown up from Mexico rather than hatched locally.  Here's Brown Longtail and White-striped Longtail.

This worn Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak looks particularly dull against the scarlet Jatropha.

Goatweed Leafwings are always a treat in the Valley.

Here is the more common Tropical Leafwing.

Elada Checkerspots are regular near the restrooms.

A spur of the moment visit racked up 41 species.  Nothing wrong with that.

• Pipevine Swallowtail 1
• Giant Swallowtail 7
• Southern Dogface 1
• Cloudless Sulphur 2
• Large Orange Sulphur 20
• Lyside Sulphur 10
• Little Yellow 6
• Gray Hairstreak 2
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 2
• Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak 1
• Cassius Blue 3
• Ceraunus Blue 10
• American Snout 6
• Gulf Fritillary 10
• Mexican Fritillary 1
• Bordered Patch 6
• Elada Checkerspot 5
• Texan Crescent 1
• Phaon Crescent 25
• Mexican Bluewing 8
• Common Mestra 1
• Tropical Leafwing 6
• Goatweed Leafwing 1
• Tawny Emperor 8
• Queen 8
• White-striped Longtail 1
• Brown Longtail 6
• Sickle-winged Skipper 1
• Brown-banded Skipper 1
• White-patched Skipper 1
• White Checkered-Skipper 3
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 12
• Laviana White-Skipper 6
• Julia's Skipper 1
• Clouded Skipper 6
• Southern Skipperling 2
• Fiery Skipper 5
• Whirlabout 1
• Southern Broken-Dash 5
• Celia's Roadside-Skipper 4
• Eufala Skipper 1

Last Butterflies before the Freeze at NBC, 1/18/25

The strongest cold front of the winter is scheduled to blast in tomorrrow and the butterflies at the National Butterfly Center were out enjoying one last glorious warm day.  The wind was from the south yesterday however today it had already switched from the north and despite that, the temperature was still in the 80's.  Now sure of the effect of this on the species composition of butterflies.  There were no real Mexican rarities but a few local uncommon species were out, some pretty fresh.  Best was this Caballo (formerly Potrillo) Skipper.

A White-patched Skipper was close by.

And later a Texas Powdered-Skipper popped up in the same Azureum patch.

And with it a fresh Marius Hairstreak.  It was a lifer for visiting butterflier Jeff Pavlik who I notice is a couple butterflies ahead of me on eButterfly.  But I recently discovered a few Australian lifers while putting bugs into iNaturalist so maybe I can get back ahead.

Here's a good looking Dusky-blue Groundstreak.

And the humble but still sharp looking Gray Hairstreak.

John Rosford found the bug of the day.  I have yet to ID this litle lady beetle but I'm pretty sure it's a lifer.

35 species is pretty good for mid January.  In a couple of days there won't be any and then we start the slow build up into spring.

• Pipevine Swallowtail 2
• Southern Dogface 2
• Large Orange Sulphur 2
• Lyside Sulphur 6
• Little Yellow 5
• Sleepy Orange 2
• Marius Hairstreak 1
• Gray Hairstreak 3
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 3
• Dusky-blue Groundstreak 1
• Ceraunus Blue 4
• Reakirt's Blue 1
• Fatal Metalmark 1
• American Snout 10
• Mexican Fritillary 1
• Texan Crescent 1
• Phaon Crescent 4
• Red Admiral 4
• White Peacock 3
• Mexican Bluewing 1
• Monarch 2
• Queen 4
• Dorantes Longtail 1
• Brown Longtail 2
• Potrillo Skipper 1
• Texas Powdered-Skipper 1
• White-patched Skipper 1
• Funereal Duskywing 1
• White Checkered-Skipper 5
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 2
• Laviana White-Skipper 5
• Clouded Skipper 4
• Fiery Skipper 3
• Sachem 2
• Eufala Skipper 6

Good south wind at Progreso Lakes, 10/16/22

Our first cold front of the fall is due tomorrow and that usually sucks up warm wind from the south before it arrives.  So I made a conscious effort to run up a butterfly list for our Progreso Lakes yard today.  Our yard is also blooming nicely and combined with the southerly wind my expectations were high.  As it turned out, there were a lot of butterflies but not anything unusual.  I think it may take a few more fronts and a few more days of southerly wind to bring up the good stuff.

Butterfly of the day goes to a couple of Fawn-spotted Skippers.  Formerly common in our yard, this species was wiped out by last year's February freeze.  These are the first I've seen since then though they are still present in the Brownsville area.

Mimosa Skippers are a specialty of the mid and lower RGV.  They use the thorny pink flowered   

mimosas that line the ditches and resacas to as a host plant.  Today I had five which is pretty unusal.

The wind brought a Mazan's Scallopwing to the yard.  We only get one or two per year.

White-patched Skippers are finally showing after a long absense.

Dorantes Longtails have also just arrived.  It seems many butterflies time their reproduction to coincide with the fall flower season.

Soldiers have recently marched into the yard for the fall.

Here's today's list of 51 species.

• Pipevine Swallowtail 1
• Giant Swallowtail 5
• Cloudless Sulphur 8
• Large Orange Sulphur 4
• Lyside Sulphur 2
• Little Yellow 10
• Mimosa Yellow 2
• Gray Hairstreak 1
• Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak 3
• Dusky-blue Groundstreak 2
• Clytie Ministreak 1
• Western Pygmy-Blue 5
• Ceraunus Blue 6
• Rounded Metalmark 6
• Red-bordered Metalmark 10
• American Snout 200
• Gulf Fritillary 5
• Bordered Patch 10
• Pearl Crescent   1
• Vesta Crescent 5
• Phaon Crescent 5
• Painted Lady 1
• Red Admiral 1
• White Peacock 15
• Tawny Emperor 8
• Queen 50
• Soldier 5
• White-striped Longtail 3
• Dorantes Longtail 1
• Brown Longtail 8
• Mimosa Skipper 5
• Mazans Scallopwing 1
• Sickle-winged Skipper 60
• White-patched Skipper 1
• Mournful Duskywing 1
• White Checkered-Skipper 6
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 8
• Laviana White-Skipper 12
• Turk's-cap White-Skipper 1
• Common Sootywing 2
• Julia's Skipper 3
• Fawn-spotted Skipper 2
• Clouded Skipper 50
• Double-dotted Skipper 4
• Southern Skipperling 3
• Fiery Skipper 6
• Whirlabout 6
• Southern Broken-Dash 10
• Common Mellana 10
• Celia's Roadside-Skipper 6
• Eufala Skipper 8