Recent sightings

A beautiful day to do some gardening. Unfortunately, I was constantly being distracted but butterflies and dragonflies.

While working, I flushed an unidentified Sulphur from my Senna plants which are just finally starting to come up. Fingers crossed!

all zabs were male

11:15 to 1:45. Partly sunny; temps in 60s; quite breezy.

2:00-3:30 PM, Sunny, Mid 60s, A bit Windy

Much too crowded. Park police were just coming in as we were leaving after we saw staff counting cars in all of the parking areas.
The highlight of the day was several Tawny Emperors munching away on Hackberry and three Giant Ichneumon Wasps with their ovipositors buried deep in a dead tree.

1:10pm-3:40pm, 65°F, breezy,, mostly sunny

11 AM - 2 PM. Sunny, 70 degrees. Delightful breeze kept butterflies down. Little Wood Satyr count could easily have been many times higher; we covered only about 1/4 of the edge of one large field. Many Pearl Crescents heavily worn. The field along River Rd at River Road Park is getting overrun with mugwort although one patch of Bird's-foot trefoil/Crown vetch remains near the parking lot.

Observations between 1:50-3:00. Partly sunny and breezy with temp. in the low 60s.
If you want to avoid the biggest crowds and get a parking space it is best to visit on a weekday.

Observations between 10:25 and 11:50 with the highest of exalted rulers, club president Garry Annibal. Unseasonably cool (60's), and breezy.
One of the Tiger Swallowtails was a very dark female with a ghost pattern at the limit of our imagination.

2:00-3:30 PM; Cool; Mixed Sun & Clouds; Occasionally Windy

11:15 to 1:30. Mostly sunny; temps in 60s; windy. A rather underwhelming visit!

2:10-4:40 PM. Sunny and breezy, 75 degrees. Red Admirals hovering around some small nettles but did not seem to be actually ovipositing.

1:30-2:00 PM. Lots of rubus blooming. One unidentified duskywing.

8:45-11:15. Sunny and warm with a slight breeze.

Finally–just a hint of skipper action

12-3pm around 75-80°. Utility cut. One Azure in a right state impossible to ID. Tough day for the camera, nothing seemed to sit still at all. Several unidentified Duskywing.

345-640pm
70s and sunny. black cohosh abundant but no app azure pics…very active and pale.

sunny, warm, and calm

10:30-11:30
Mostly sunny and warm enough for some action.

Our count of 220 Little Wood Satyrs may be conservative.

12:45 to 2:00. Mostly sunny.

11:00 to 12:15. Mostly sunny. Cloudless Sulphur only pierid at this location!!

11:30 -12:45, Sunny, Breezy at first Calm later, Temperature in mid 60s
No Pepper and Salt Skippers

out of spring ephemerals; blackberry bushes blooming

Around the 80s. 2.30-4-30. Pepper and Salt along lower section. A few unidentified Duskywings, one seriously worn individual.

Partly cloudy and warm.

Saw a female Giant Swallowtail laying eggs on my Pink Gasplant! I couldn’t get a picture of her but you can see the egg at the very top of the leaf.

1:30 to 3:30. Mostly overcast & warm with little breaks of sun.

11:00 to 1:30. Mostly overcast with rare breaks of sun.

Primarily looking for dragonflies, but had a nice find.

Spent a good amount of time (~80 min) looking unsuccessfully for Roadside-Skippers from Raccoon Ridge to the powerline area.

2.45-4.30. Around low 80s. Snowberry Clearwing and Nessus Sphinx also present. Possible Sachem also.

2:30-4 PM. Sunny, 75-80 F. Rubus and one patch of wild geranium blooming but nothing nectaring. One Pearl crescent quite worn and tattered,

1:45pm-4:30pm, mostly sunny, 82°F, slight breeze, lots of Wild Geranium and Rubus along the utility ROW

warm, sunny 5-7 pm
lots of construction projects in this park
some milk weed coming up but not sure what else

Along the powerline, 2:15 to 4:20 PM, Sunny, warm, 82 deg.F.
There were as many non-identified flying butterflies as there were identified. Scarcity of nectar sources kept the butterflies on the wing rather than stationary.

Cloudy early then increasing sunshine and warm.

Photos from Doryce Wheeler

11:00 to 1:00. Warm, sunny.

Observed while gardening early to mid-afternoon.

On our way back from birding various preserves earlier in the day, we made a brief stop late morning and walked through the grassland area. On our way back to the car, we found an Eight-spotted Forester in the path that I safely relocated to some honeysuckle where it nectared for a few seconds and then flew off.

Did the field loop only…RBHA, READ, EACO were along fence line

130-330pm
70s and sunny.

Early to mid 60s. Mostly sunny. 12-2

2:45pm-4:00pm, 50% sun, 69°F, Pepper and Salt Skipper hanging out in a modest patch of Wild Geraniums was a nice surprise

1:10pm-2:30pm, 69°F, 50%sun, breezy, no Harvesters or aphids seen

one zab female- others were male; also saw a too-fast-flying to ID angle wing; lots of gooseberry bushes

Cloudy, low 60s. 12:30-1:45.

I have been seeing a very small number of Sachems in the spring in town during the past several years (normally seen commonly only August-October).

A good amount of Wild Geranium flowering along wood edges. Sunlight patches of this attractive nectar source are always worth checking for grass skippers.

These once lovely limestone forests are now severely degraded with alien invasive plants chief among them Garlic Mustard, Japanese Barberry, and Autumn Olive. The fields, which are mowed annually, have patches of mugwort and, more recently, Chervil.

Dagmar Dale Trail, North Loop; 12-1:30 PM, Sunny, High 60s, Calm

9:30-10:15, full sun, 57º.

I may be way off in thinking that the Hooded Warbler had a Harvester but could not come up with anything closer. Seems to be a Lycaenid based on antennae, striped legs and head.

[mod]: Incredible photo, Steve.

late start and clouds moved in fast. 73F and warm.

Sunny. Temps in 60's.

10:00 - 11:30AM, Mixed Sun & Clouds, Calm, Temperature in Low 70s

Sunny, ca. 70 degrees. 10 AM - 12:30 PM. Abundant Cypress spurge only significant nectar but no butterflies were using it - all that I saw were either fly-by or flushed from low vegetation.

The Blues are an estimate. I stopped counting after having 30 in 1/8 of a mile. There were more than 100

10:45am-1:15pm, 64°F, sunny, slight breeze

Sunny but breezy, 70 degrees

10:00-2:00, full sun, 55-70º. This was our fourth consecutive annual May survey at this facility, most of which has been closed to the public since 9/11. (We are allowed to conduct butterfly surveys as volunteers to the NJ Endangered and Nongame species Program.) We survey in mid- to late May primarily for the very small population of Common Roadside-Skippers. This year a utility company had sprayed herbicide under power lines that cross a field that we survey annually. We also found that the Forest Service (presumably) had recently bulldozed and widened the fire-break trail at the upper reservoir where we find Roadside-Skippers. Seeing the damage, we were not optimistic, but a few hardy Roadsides did turn up to make our day.

For those who wish to access Yards Creek, check in at the guard station at the end of Walnut Valley Road and ask permission to access the Kaiser hiking trail near the old Boy Scout camp. You will be directed to a small parking lot near the camp. The facility is limiting this lot to 5 vehicles so it best to visit on a weekday. On weekends this lot fills up shortly after 8 when the guard station opens. The Kaiser Trail intersects the AT. By turning left (south) on the AT one may be able to find the sought-after Roadside-Skipper near the Raccoon Ridge hawk lookout. Check openings along the trail where Little Bluestem grass grows. The stretch of trail between the hawk lookout and the powerline to the south can be especially good. This area can also be reached by hiking the AT south from Camp Mohican Road in Blairstown.

In addition to the listed butterflies we saw a mother bear with 2 very small cubs, and 6 Bald Eagles. We also re-found 2 small Rhodora shrubs in the same location that we first discovered in 1999. Rhodora is an S1 species in NJ (very rare with no more than 5 known locations).

9:30-1:00, sunny and breezy, mid 60’s
Possible flyby Snout

64°F, sunny, breezy

Two species ovipositing in the garden today. Cabbage White on Cress and Wild Indigo Duskywing on Crown Vetch.