Xami Hairstreak at Progreso Lakes, 12/21/18

It's been kind of a slow fall for butterflies and I've been doing more birding so the blog has been neglected a bit.  But this morning I was out in our Progreso Lakes yard checking out the birds when I peered into our flame vine as I usually do when I pass it.  And there was this little green hairstreak.  At first I just got a glimpse of only green and started thinking about greenstreaks but a better look revealed the white "M" of the Xami Hairstreak.  Yowzer!  There's been a few around the Valley lately so I was not shocked but darn!  What a good butterfly!  And #111 for the yard.

Mike and Ginny came over before doing the Estero walk and Mike found this Mazan's Scallopwing.  Only the third time for our yard.

Here's a Guava Skipper in action.

Lots of Sickle-winged Skippers this fall.  This is the first butterfly I have ever seen nectar on a pigeon berry.

Nice sunny weather in the forecast so maybe some other good stuff will show up.

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!

Six Metalmarks and no Fatal, 10/25/14

This morning I was getting ready to run over to Resaca de la Palma State Park in Cameron County to meet Jim Burns from Phoenix to look for darners to photograph.  Just as I was getting ready to get in the car I stepped out in the alley and looked up.  There above me in a hackberry was the first Red-bordered Metalmark I've seen in our yard yard, species #89.

I made the trip over to Resaca and could see it was going to be a good butterfly day.  A bit later Jim arrived and we walked the Ebony Trail looking for hard to find dragonflies.  Some good stuff has been seen on this trail but not much lately.  We failed to find any darners but I got Jim on his first Boisduval's Yellow.  I can tell he's going to drink the Kool-Aid and seriously add butterflies to his photography subjects some day.

At the end of the boardwalk I though the habitat looked good for Rainpool Spreadwing, a damsel fly Jim wanted to photograph.  And sure enough I found some spreadwings, but they weren't Rainpools.  They were the very rare Blue-striped Spreadwing, a very pretty damselfly species I've never seen before and a first record for Cameron County.

At this point I figured I was riding a lucky streak and Jim was happy so we headed back to the butterfly garden to see what had come out after the morning had warmed some.  One of the first butterflies we saw upon entering the garden was the long-staying Two-barred Flasher who's getting a bit worn.

I soon found a Rounded Metalmark which isn't that great but was metalmark #2 for the day.

And shortly thereafter Dick Wilson arrived and quickly found us some knockout Blue Metalmarks.  This was enough to get Jim taking photos and forget about dragonflies for a while.  Metalmark #3.

And then Dick shout's out "Erichson's White-Skipper".  I didn't get a great photo but it was my first for Cameron County.

Meanwhile a Guava Skipper was putting on quite a show.

Somewhere during the morning, visiting butterfly watchers Ken Wilson and Ray Brunn, had joined the fun.  It didn't take long before I found a Walker's Metalmark (metalmark # 4) and everyone enjoyed taking photos.  Dick soon found  us a perfect one.

Then Sherry Wilson found us a very nice Curve-winged Metalmark, only the third I've ever seen and metalmark # 5 for the day.

I did a little more searching and dug up my sixth metalmark of the day, a not too rare Red-bordered Metalmark.  It's a shame I couldn't find a Fatal Metalmark for # 7.  But I'm not complaining!

At this point Jim had left to search for dragonflies at Santa Ana and Ken and Ray were talking about Xami Hairstreaks.  So we drove over to the Smiley Face on FM 4 where Bill Supulski and the gang (Dottie, John and Audrey) had found Xamis yesterday.  It didn't take long to find two of them.

The other area specialties, Pale-rayed Skipper and Saltbush Sootywing, failed to show up.  Here's the Resaca de La Palma list.

• Pipevine Swallowtail 1
• Giant Swallowtail 1
• Cloudless Sulphur 20
• Lyside Sulphur 10
• Little Yellow 3
• Silver-banded Hairstreak 3
• Western Pygmy-Blue 25
• Ceraunus Blue 5
• Rounded Metalmark 1
• Red-bordered Metalmark 1
• Blue Metalmark 6
• Curve-winged Metalmark 1
• Walker's Metalmark 2
• American Snout 5
• Gulf Fritillary 4
• Zebra Heliconian 3
• Bordered Patch 3
• Elada Crescent 8
• Phaon Crescent 6
• Pearl Crescent 1
• Painted Lady 1
• Red Admiral 1
• Common Buckeye 1
• White Peacock 5
• Mexican Bluewing 5
• Queen 30
• Guava Skipper 2
• White-striped Longtail 1
• Long-tailed Skipper 2
• Dorantes Longtail 1
• Brown Longtail 4
• Two-barred Flasher 1
• Mimosa Skipper 3
• Sickle-winged Skipper 20
• White Checkered-Skipper 3
• Tropical Checkered-Skipper 6
• Erichson's White-Skipper 1
• Fawn-spotted Skipper 1
• Clouded Skipper 15
• Fiery Skipper 10
• Southern Broken-Dash 12
• Sachem 1
• Celia's Roadside-Skipper 2
• Eufala Skipper 5
• Ocola Skipper 1