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2 Feb Re: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication [Kojiro Shiraiwa ] 3 Feb SE AZ Spring Butterfly Count: Sabino Canyon/Sta. Catalina Mtns, NE Tucson, AZ Sunday 3/25/12 [mary klinkel ] 3 Feb NE Tucson AZ Sabino Canyon 2/2/12 [mary klinkel ] 2 Feb Re: Fw: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication [lynn monroe ] 1 Feb Fw: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication [] 31 Jan RE: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication ["Mark Walker" ] 30 Jan Re: California early/late flight periods publication [Kojiro Shiraiwa ] 30 Jan Re: Anza Borrego Desert State Park January 26-8 2012 [Fred Heath ] 30 Jan Re: South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ ["John Saba" ] 30 Jan Anza Borrego Desert State Park January 26-8 2012 [] 30 Jan Fw: South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ [] 30 Jan California early/late flight periods publication [] 30 Jan Weekend Butterflies (1/28-1/29), Orange County, CA ["Rich Schilk" ] 29 Jan SEABA Field Trip to Molino Basin 29 Jan [Fred Heath ] 29 Jan South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ ["artfullbirds" ] 29 Jan Fallbrook, San Diego Co. [Kojiro Shiraiwa ] 29 Jan Re: Patagonia Butterfly Garden [chris kline ] 29 Jan Patagonia Butterfly Garden [chris kline ] 28 Jan Otay Lake, San Diego Co. [Kojiro Shiraiwa ] 29 Jan Anza-Borrego Desert State Park ["Pete" ] 27 Jan PRESEASON SCOUTING REPORT [] 26 Jan SE AZ: Molino Basin, Santa Catalina Mts. ["Ken" ] 20 Jan Common names in California paper [] 19 Jan Fw: Hesperia pahaska near pahaska [] 17 Jan Fw: Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? [] 16 Jan Re: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? [Ray Stanford ] 16 Jan RE: SE AZ butterfly sightings in the past few days [Todd Stout ] 16 Jan Re: SE AZ butterfly sightings in the past few days [] 16 Jan SE AZ butterfly sightings in the past few days [mary klinkel ] 15 Jan SoCal spring [Kojiro Shiraiwa ] 16 Jan Early California Butterflies [] 13 Jan Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? [] 13 Jan SEAZ Molino Basin sara ["Ken" ] 13 Jan RE: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? ["Mark Walker" ] 13 Jan RE:sive/gryneus and Pratt's article on the hairsteaks ["Steve Cary" ] 13 Jan Re: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? ["Hank Brodkin" ] 12 Jan Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? [] 12 Jan RE: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? [Todd Stout ] 12 Jan Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? [] 11 Jan Re: Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 [Bruce Walsh ] 11 Jan Re: Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 [] 11 Jan Re: Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 ["Ken" ] 11 Jan Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 [Lori Arthur ] 11 Jan NE Tucson AZ: first butterfly of 2012 [mary klinkel ] 9 Jan Re: [DesertLeps] Spring in San Diego (early records?) [Pete Spino ] 8 Jan Spring in San Diego (early records?) [Kojiro Shiraiwa ] 8 Jan NM: The First Stirrings [Elaine Halbedel ] 7 Jan My AOL Account Was Hacked [] 7 Jan staceysplace2005 [] 6 Jan Tucson Botanical Gardens 1/5/11 [mary klinkel ] 05 Jan re SEAZ early Asterocampa leilia ["Ken" ] 05 Jan SEAZ early Asterocampa leilia ["Ken" ] 5 Jan FW: Box Canyon today (1/3/12) SE AZ [mary klinkel ] 5 Jan NE Tucson Agua Caliente Park 1/4/11 [mary klinkel ] 2 Jan SEABA field trips New Year's Eve & New Year's Day [mary klinkel ] 1 Jan In the Spirit of Season Summaries and Goodwill Toward Man ["Mark Walker" ] 1 Jan 2011 Season Summary butterfly records sent off [] 30 Dec Monarchs Overwintering in the Desert [Paul Cherubini ] 30 Dec Re: Re: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good [Pete Spino ] 30 Dec Crazy, tiny Buckeye... [Liam OBrien ] 30 Dec Re: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good [Kojiro Shiraiwa ] 30 Dec RE: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good ["Mark Walker" ] 29 Dec Carlsbad was pretty good [Pete Spino ] 27 Dec (unknown) [Bruce Walsh ] 27 Dec RE: [DesertLeps] Oceanside Christmas ["Mark Walker" ] 27 Dec South Florida December 1-15 2011 [] 27 Dec Re: [DesertLeps] Oceanside Christmas [] 27 Dec Re: [leps-talk] Oceanside Christmas [Alex Grkovich ] 26 Dec Oceanside Christmas ["Mark Walker" ] 23 Dec Fw: Fw: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress [] 23 Dec NE USA & Canada 2003-2011 Butterflies and Moths Photo Collection [] 22 Dec Fw: Fw: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress [] 22 Dec Fw: Re: Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary [] 22 Dec Re: Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary [Todd Stout ] 22 Dec Fw: Re: Fw: [SoWestLep] Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary [] 22 Dec Fw: Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary [] Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication From: Kojiro Shiraiwa <whiterock AT bekkoame.ne.jp> Date: Thu, 2 Feb 2012 22:28:49 -0800 Hi Ken, Frank's ventral photo looks like Desert Black Swallowtail to me. The eyespot (not center like Anise) and width of black band on hind wings, round yellow spots on marginal forewings (square and often continuous on Anise) and texture of scattered yellow scales all look like DBS. Also, the pointy forewings. Koji On 2012/02/01, at 21:47, wrote: > > Frank, Mark, Fred, Koji and others: > > Thanks for the input on Frank's photo of a swallowtail in Plum Canyon. A problematic photo to ID for sure...I can't fault someone for not netting the butterfly in a state park. It does illustrate problems of ID based on a photo in which key field marks are not visible. To make matters worse, while the shape of the median band spots on the FW of P. polyxenes coloro tend to be ocellate in shape as compared to rectangular in the Anise Swallowtail, I have found such field marks not always reliable in every individual, at least not with the rectangular shaped spots (some I have from the Providence Mts.(1978 before it became a Preserve) have median band spots like zelicaon, but Anise Swallowtails are not known from there). And there are similar problems with the shape of the spots along the borders of the FW. In the Butterflies of Anza-Borrego State Parks book by the Munroes, the flying "Anise Swallowtail" at the bottom of page 19 looks like a "Desert Black Swa llowtail" to my eyes with ocellate shape median band spots and very rounded FW spots. Frank's swallowtail shows blue spotting reduced in nature as is often found in coloro, extra black scaling on the HW and my impression of the yellow band on the abdomen is that it is reduced in size as compared to zelicaon. But the median band of spots and shape of the spots along the edges could be indicative of zelicaon, but not necessarily. And we can't see the abdomen from the top. My "gut feeling" based on how this thing looks to me and Mark's pertinent comment on the location of Plum Canyon is that I believe (but can't be 100% sure) he observed a Desert Black Swallowtail (Papilio polyxenes coloro). > > Since I can't be really positive about this, I'll make note of Frank's probable record while keeping the previous early record. Surely both species must fly in January. I should be able to find Anise Swallowtails at Sandcut in Kern County within a couple weeks and some of those occasionally have "polyxenes spots" on their abdomens. > > Ken Davenport > > Ken, > > I would say that Pete and Frank's id of a Papilio polyxenes coloro at Plum > Canyon is pretty certain. I've never seen anything but coloro down in Anza > Borrego, and it's almost always seen - especially early in the season. > > Mark. > > From: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com] On > Behalf Of kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > Sent: Monday, January 30, 2012 10:46 AM > To: Todd Stout; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com > Subject: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication > > All: > > The California early and late flight period publication has been updated > through January 24, 2012 and now has common names in addition to the > scientific ones. Two early state records recorded January 28th are not in > the report: Phyciodes mylitta from Pt. Reyes, Marin County by Jules Evens > and Callophrys dumetorum dumetorum ((Coastal Green Hairstreak) from San > Francisco by Liam O'Brien. It can be found at the International Lepidoptera > Survey website under NEWS items. Make sure you click on the latest version. > Thanks Todd Stout for posting that at the website. And thanks to those of > you who have donated money to keep that website on line. > > Common names are given for many subspecies which many believe facilitates > getting them listed as protected when these are believed threatened or > endangered. Some subspecies names are well used while others are ignored > (how many people use subspecies names for Strymon melinus (Gray > Hairstreaks?). BOA tends to use only the common name for the whole species > and all of its subspecies. A matter of personal preference. Use or don'[t > use as you prefer. > > Some subspecies had no real common name; others were derived from the > original descriptions based on the meaning of the scientific name, habitat > or geographic range. The common names are often the ones in common usage, > often predating the NABA ones. Sometimes, more than one common names are > used. The name "Variable Checkerspot" is not used since what is variable to > some is three or more species to many of us. Almost all checkerspots are > variable. So the names in the paper are Chalcedon, Anicia and Colon > Checkerspots. NABA's Bramble Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) included both > the Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) and Coastal Green Hairstreak > (Callophrys dumetorum) which are two species to many of us. Similar issues > occur with the Juniper Hairstreaks complex, Mormon Metalmark complex and > Euphilotes blues. So while some ask why we can't have just one list of > standardized names, both scientific and common names...the reality is > obvious as Jonathan Pelham already explained. There is not agreement in the > butterfly community for reasons well discussed on these leps serves in terms > of what species to recognize. The early/late publication is a "split" list > to facilitate tracking each entity including subspecies or even segregates > that may warrant subspecies status. Others are likely synonyms (Plebejus > lupini chlorina and P. lupini argentata for example) and will eventually be > combined when such beliefs are confirmed. Many of those subspecies names > will not be found in your watcher only field guides, or even your collector > field guides. They may only be found in technical scientific papers and > books. Some subspecies are very distinctive, others not. Some names are > probably of very questionable value. The purpose of the early-late paper in > not to resolve such issues, but to keep data for each entity until such > issues are resolved. You as individuals can split or lump as you like. You > can also use the list to see if you found something unusually early or late > in the flight periods of these butterflies, if so let me know. But such > reports being used may be subject to credibility of the observer, having an > actual specimen or a photograph depending on what butterfly and what > misidentifications might be a factor. Those were possible factors for many > of the records reported so far in 2012. > > One question for the group. Frank Model and Pete Spino reported a Desert > Black Swallowtail in Plum Canyon this January. Those of you who frequent > that area...is it only P. polyxenes coloro that occurs there? or do Anise > Swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) occur there as well? Such problems are > examples of problems confronting record keepers wanting to keep the data > straight and accurate. One person asked if P. polyxenes and P. zelicaon ever > hybridized and my answer would be yes based on some specimens I have taken > in the Sandcut area where the southern San Joaquin Valley meets the > Tehachapi Mts. in Kern County, California. I guess I need to start keeping > such examples. > > Ken Davenport > > Best Wishes, Ken Davenport > kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" C 1999 > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: SE AZ Spring Butterfly Count: Sabino Canyon/Sta. Catalina Mtns, NE Tucson, AZ Sunday 3/25/12 From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Fri, 3 Feb 2012 04:31:59 +0100 The Sabino Canyon/Santa Catalina Mountains Spring Butterfly Count will be held Sunday, March 25, 2012. We will meet at 9 AM at the Visitor Center Pavilion at Sabino Canyon (Coronado Pass required for parking) to begin with lower elevation areas and we will move up the mountain along the Catalina Hwy as the day warms up. You are welcome, wanted, appreciated and needed for this count. Even if you only have one hour or only know one butterfly, we can use your help. Please RSVP to Mary Klinkel, compiler (munchita AT msn.com) if you have questions or would like to be assigned to a certain area. Each participant is expected to pay $3 to NABA for compilation expenses. Please bring $1 bills to make it easy for your compiler. Everyone is welcome to join the compilation dinner at your own expense, to be held at Casa de Molina Restaurant, 4240 E. Grant Road, Tucson, AZ, meeting there around 4:30 - 5PM. Please let me know if you plan to have dinner so I can let the restaurant know how many to expect. Thank you! Mary Klinkel [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: NE Tucson AZ Sabino Canyon 2/2/12 From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Fri, 3 Feb 2012 04:09:45 +0100 I enjoyed about 3 hours wandering through desert / riparian habitat at Sabino Canyon in the Santa Catalina Mountains this afternoon, with temps in the high 60's and pretty strong winds. Nevertheless, I saw some new species for the year (for me) and others that I had already seen in 2012, braving the gusts. Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis sara) about 10 Desert Orangetip (Anthocharis cethura) possible, fly-by Southern Dogface (Zerene cesonia) one Dainty Sulphur (Nathalis iole) one Marine Blue (Leptotes marina) one Spring Azure (Celastrina ladon) many Common Buckeye (Junonia coenia) one, new species for me this year Mourning Cloak (Nymphalis antiopa) one Empress Leilia (Asterocampa leilia) one very fresh, photos available, new species for me this year AZ Powdered-skipper (Systasea zampa) one, new species for me this year Violet-clouded Skipper (Lerodea arabus) one very fresh, photos available, new species for me this year, possible early record Mary Klinkel, Tucson, AZ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: Fw: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication From: lynn monroe <lynnmon AT juno.com> Date: Thu, 2 Feb 2012 10:42:56 -0700 Hi all, The reason the flying Anise Swallowtail at the bottom of page 19 looks like a 'Desert' Black Swallowtail is because it is! Ray Stanford pointed this out to us. Lynn Monroe \\On Wed, 1 Feb 2012 21:47:31 -0800 writes: Frank, Mark, Fred, Koji and others: Thanks for the input on Frank's photo of a swallowtail in Plum Canyon. A problematic photo to ID for sure...I can't fault someone for not netting the butterfly in a state park. It does illustrate problems of ID based on a photo in which key field marks are not visible. To make matters worse, while the shape of the median band spots on the FW of P. polyxenes coloro tend to be ocellate in shape as compared to rectangular in the Anise Swallowtail, I have found such field marks not always reliable in every individual, at least not with the rectangular shaped spots (some I have from the Providence Mts.(1978 before it became a Preserve) have median band spots like zelicaon, but Anise Swallowtails are not known from there). And there are similar problems with the shape of the spots along the borders of the FW. In the Butterflies of Anza-Borrego State Parks book by the Munroes, the flying "Anise Swallowtail" at the bottom of page 19 looks like a "Desert Black Swallowtail" to my eyes with ocellate shape median band spots and very rounded FW spots. Frank's swallowtail shows blue spotting reduced in nature as is often found in coloro, extra black scaling on the HW and my impression of the yellow band on the abdomen is that it is reduced in size as compared to zelicaon. But the median band of spots and shape of the spots along the edges could be indicative of zelicaon, but not necessarily. And we can't see the abdomen from the top. My "gut feeling" based on how this thing looks to me and Mark's pertinent comment on the location of Plum Canyon is that I believe (but can't be 100% sure) he observed a Desert Black Swallowtail (Papilio polyxenes coloro). Since I can't be really positive about this, I'll make note of Frank's probable record while keeping the previous early record. Surely both species must fly in January. I should be able to find Anise Swallowtails at Sandcut in Kern County within a couple weeks and some of those occasionally have "polyxenes spots" on their abdomens. Ken Davenport Ken, I would say that Pete and Frank's id of a Papilio polyxenes coloro at Plum Canyon is pretty certain. I've never seen anything but coloro down in Anza Borrego, and it's almost always seen - especially early in the season. Mark. From: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Sent: Monday, January 30, 2012 10:46 AM To: Todd Stout; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com Subject: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication All: The California early and late flight period publication has been updated through January 24, 2012 and now has common names in addition to the scientific ones. Two early state records recorded January 28th are not in the report: Phyciodes mylitta from Pt. Reyes, Marin County by Jules Evens and Callophrys dumetorum dumetorum ((Coastal Green Hairstreak) from San Francisco by Liam O'Brien. It can be found at the International Lepidoptera Survey website under NEWS items. Make sure you click on the latest version. Thanks Todd Stout for posting that at the website. And thanks to those of you who have donated money to keep that website on line. Common names are given for many subspecies which many believe facilitates getting them listed as protected when these are believed threatened or endangered. Some subspecies names are well used while others are ignored (how many people use subspecies names for Strymon melinus (Gray Hairstreaks?). BOA tends to use only the common name for the whole species and all of its subspecies. A matter of personal preference. Use or don'[t use as you prefer. Some subspecies had no real common name; others were derived from the original descriptions based on the meaning of the scientific name, habitat or geographic range. The common names are often the ones in common usage, often predating the NABA ones. Sometimes, more than one common names are used. The name "Variable Checkerspot" is not used since what is variable to some is three or more species to many of us. Almost all checkerspots are variable. So the names in the paper are Chalcedon, Anicia and Colon Checkerspots. NABA's Bramble Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) included both the Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) and Coastal Green Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) which are two species to many of us. Similar issues occur with the Juniper Hairstreaks complex, Mormon Metalmark complex and Euphilotes blues. So while some ask why we can't have just one list of standardized names, both scientific and common names...the reality is obvious as Jonathan Pelham already explained. There is not agreement in the butterfly community for reasons well discussed on these leps serves in terms of what species to recognize. The early/late publication is a "split" list to facilitate tracking each entity including subspecies or even segregates that may warrant subspecies status. Others are likely synonyms (Plebejus lupini chlorina and P. lupini argentata for example) and will eventually be combined when such beliefs are confirmed. Many of those subspecies names will not be found in your watcher only field guides, or even your collector field guides. They may only be found in technical scientific papers and books. Some subspecies are very distinctive, others not. Some names are probably of very questionable value. The purpose of the early-late paper in not to resolve such issues, but to keep data for each entity until such issues are resolved. You as individuals can split or lump as you like. You can also use the list to see if you found something unusually early or late in the flight periods of these butterflies, if so let me know. But such reports being used may be subject to credibility of the observer, having an actual specimen or a photograph depending on what butterfly and what misidentifications might be a factor. Those were possible factors for many of the records reported so far in 2012. One question for the group. Frank Model and Pete Spino reported a Desert Black Swallowtail in Plum Canyon this January. Those of you who frequent that area...is it only P. polyxenes coloro that occurs there? or do Anise Swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) occur there as well? Such problems are examples of problems confronting record keepers wanting to keep the data straight and accurate. One person asked if P. polyxenes and P. zelicaon ever hybridized and my answer would be yes based on some specimens I have taken in the Sandcut area where the southern San Joaquin Valley meets the Tehachapi Mts. in Kern County, California. I guess I need to start keeping such examples. Ken Davenport Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" C 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ____________________________________________________________ 57 Year Old Looks 27 Local Woman Reveals Wrinkle Secret That Has Doctors Angry. http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3141/4f2acb4849fb069e3dast05vuc [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Wed, 1 Feb 2012 21:47:31 -0800 Frank, Mark, Fred, Koji and others: Thanks for the input on Frank's photo of a swallowtail in Plum Canyon. A problematic photo to ID for sure...I can't fault someone for not netting the butterfly in a state park. It does illustrate problems of ID based on a photo in which key field marks are not visible. To make matters worse, while the shape of the median band spots on the FW of P. polyxenes coloro tend to be ocellate in shape as compared to rectangular in the Anise Swallowtail, I have found such field marks not always reliable in every individual, at least not with the rectangular shaped spots (some I have from the Providence Mts.(1978 before it became a Preserve) have median band spots like zelicaon, but Anise Swallowtails are not known from there). And there are similar problems with the shape of the spots along the borders of the FW. In the Butterflies of Anza-Borrego State Parks book by the Munroes, the flying "Anise Swallowtail" at the bottom of page 19 looks like a "Desert Black Swallowtail" to my eyes with ocellate shape median band spots and very rounded FW spots. Frank's swallowtail shows blue spotting reduced in nature as is often found in coloro, extra black scaling on the HW and my impression of the yellow band on the abdomen is that it is reduced in size as compared to zelicaon. But the median band of spots and shape of the spots along the edges could be indicative of zelicaon, but not necessarily. And we can't see the abdomen from the top. My "gut feeling" based on how this thing looks to me and Mark's pertinent comment on the location of Plum Canyon is that I believe (but can't be 100% sure) he observed a Desert Black Swallowtail (Papilio polyxenes coloro). Since I can't be really positive about this, I'll make note of Frank's probable record while keeping the previous early record. Surely both species must fly in January. I should be able to find Anise Swallowtails at Sandcut in Kern County within a couple weeks and some of those occasionally have "polyxenes spots" on their abdomens. Ken Davenport Ken, I would say that Pete and Frank's id of a Papilio polyxenes coloro at Plum Canyon is pretty certain. I've never seen anything but coloro down in Anza Borrego, and it's almost always seen - especially early in the season. Mark. From: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Sent: Monday, January 30, 2012 10:46 AM To: Todd Stout; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com Subject: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication All: The California early and late flight period publication has been updated through January 24, 2012 and now has common names in addition to the scientific ones. Two early state records recorded January 28th are not in the report: Phyciodes mylitta from Pt. Reyes, Marin County by Jules Evens and Callophrys dumetorum dumetorum ((Coastal Green Hairstreak) from San Francisco by Liam O'Brien. It can be found at the International Lepidoptera Survey website under NEWS items. Make sure you click on the latest version. Thanks Todd Stout for posting that at the website. And thanks to those of you who have donated money to keep that website on line. Common names are given for many subspecies which many believe facilitates getting them listed as protected when these are believed threatened or endangered. Some subspecies names are well used while others are ignored (how many people use subspecies names for Strymon melinus (Gray Hairstreaks?). BOA tends to use only the common name for the whole species and all of its subspecies. A matter of personal preference. Use or don'[t use as you prefer. Some subspecies had no real common name; others were derived from the original descriptions based on the meaning of the scientific name, habitat or geographic range. The common names are often the ones in common usage, often predating the NABA ones. Sometimes, more than one common names are used. The name "Variable Checkerspot" is not used since what is variable to some is three or more species to many of us. Almost all checkerspots are variable. So the names in the paper are Chalcedon, Anicia and Colon Checkerspots. NABA's Bramble Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) included both the Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) and Coastal Green Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) which are two species to many of us. Similar issues occur with the Juniper Hairstreaks complex, Mormon Metalmark complex and Euphilotes blues. So while some ask why we can't have just one list of standardized names, both scientific and common names...the reality is obvious as Jonathan Pelham already explained. There is not agreement in the butterfly community for reasons well discussed on these leps serves in terms of what species to recognize. The early/late publication is a "split" list to facilitate tracking each entity including subspecies or even segregates that may warrant subspecies status. Others are likely synonyms (Plebejus lupini chlorina and P. lupini argentata for example) and will eventually be combined when such beliefs are confirmed. Many of those subspecies names will not be found in your watcher only field guides, or even your collector field guides. They may only be found in technical scientific papers and books. Some subspecies are very distinctive, others not. Some names are probably of very questionable value. The purpose of the early-late paper in not to resolve such issues, but to keep data for each entity until such issues are resolved. You as individuals can split or lump as you like. You can also use the list to see if you found something unusually early or late in the flight periods of these butterflies, if so let me know. But such reports being used may be subject to credibility of the observer, having an actual specimen or a photograph depending on what butterfly and what misidentifications might be a factor. Those were possible factors for many of the records reported so far in 2012. One question for the group. Frank Model and Pete Spino reported a Desert Black Swallowtail in Plum Canyon this January. Those of you who frequent that area...is it only P. polyxenes coloro that occurs there? or do Anise Swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) occur there as well? Such problems are examples of problems confronting record keepers wanting to keep the data straight and accurate. One person asked if P. polyxenes and P. zelicaon ever hybridized and my answer would be yes based on some specimens I have taken in the Sandcut area where the southern San Joaquin Valley meets the Tehachapi Mts. in Kern County, California. I guess I need to start keeping such examples. Ken Davenport Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" C 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: RE: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication From: "Mark Walker" <xvermontrz AT att.net> Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2012 05:06:54 -0800 Ken, I would say that Pete and Frank's id of a Papilio polyxenes coloro at Plum Canyon is pretty certain. I've never seen anything but coloro down in Anza Borrego, and it's almost always seen - especially early in the season. Mark. From: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Sent: Monday, January 30, 2012 10:46 AM To: Todd Stout; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com Subject: [DesertLeps] California early/late flight periods publication All: The California early and late flight period publication has been updated through January 24, 2012 and now has common names in addition to the scientific ones. Two early state records recorded January 28th are not in the report: Phyciodes mylitta from Pt. Reyes, Marin County by Jules Evens and Callophrys dumetorum dumetorum ((Coastal Green Hairstreak) from San Francisco by Liam O'Brien. It can be found at the International Lepidoptera Survey website under NEWS items. Make sure you click on the latest version. Thanks Todd Stout for posting that at the website. And thanks to those of you who have donated money to keep that website on line. Common names are given for many subspecies which many believe facilitates getting them listed as protected when these are believed threatened or endangered. Some subspecies names are well used while others are ignored (how many people use subspecies names for Strymon melinus (Gray Hairstreaks?). BOA tends to use only the common name for the whole species and all of its subspecies. A matter of personal preference. Use or don'[t use as you prefer. Some subspecies had no real common name; others were derived from the original descriptions based on the meaning of the scientific name, habitat or geographic range. The common names are often the ones in common usage, often predating the NABA ones. Sometimes, more than one common names are used. The name "Variable Checkerspot" is not used since what is variable to some is three or more species to many of us. Almost all checkerspots are variable. So the names in the paper are Chalcedon, Anicia and Colon Checkerspots. NABA's Bramble Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) included both the Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) and Coastal Green Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) which are two species to many of us. Similar issues occur with the Juniper Hairstreaks complex, Mormon Metalmark complex and Euphilotes blues. So while some ask why we can't have just one list of standardized names, both scientific and common names...the reality is obvious as Jonathan Pelham already explained. There is not agreement in the butterfly community for reasons well discussed on these leps serves in terms of what species to recognize. The early/late publication is a "split" list to facilitate tracking each entity including subspecies or even segregates that may warrant subspecies status. Others are likely synonyms (Plebejus lupini chlorina and P. lupini argentata for example) and will eventually be combined when such beliefs are confirmed. Many of those subspecies names will not be found in your watcher only field guides, or even your collector field guides. They may only be found in technical scientific papers and books. Some subspecies are very distinctive, others not. Some names are probably of very questionable value. The purpose of the early-late paper in not to resolve such issues, but to keep data for each entity until such issues are resolved. You as individuals can split or lump as you like. You can also use the list to see if you found something unusually early or late in the flight periods of these butterflies, if so let me know. But such reports being used may be subject to credibility of the observer, having an actual specimen or a photograph depending on what butterfly and what misidentifications might be a factor. Those were possible factors for many of the records reported so far in 2012. One question for the group. Frank Model and Pete Spino reported a Desert Black Swallowtail in Plum Canyon this January. Those of you who frequent that area...is it only P. polyxenes coloro that occurs there? or do Anise Swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) occur there as well? Such problems are examples of problems confronting record keepers wanting to keep the data straight and accurate. One person asked if P. polyxenes and P. zelicaon ever hybridized and my answer would be yes based on some specimens I have taken in the Sandcut area where the southern San Joaquin Valley meets the Tehachapi Mts. in Kern County, California. I guess I need to start keeping such examples. Ken Davenport Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" C 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: California early/late flight periods publication From: Kojiro Shiraiwa <whiterock AT bekkoame.ne.jp> Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 23:34:56 -0800 Hi Ken, My answer to your question below is yes & probably. Anise (P. zelicaon) and Desert Black (P. p. coloro) both observed and I have taken 2 possible hybrids in Laguna Mountains. I've checked genitalia of both P. zelicaon and P.p.coloro and they are almost identical too. Koji > One question for the group. Frank Model and Pete Spino reported a Desert Black Swallowtail in Plum Canyon this January. Those of you who frequent that area...is it only P. polyxenes coloro that occurs there? or do Anise Swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) occur there as well? Such problems are examples of problems confronting record keepers wanting to keep the data straight and accurate. One person asked if P. polyxenes and P. zelicaon ever hybridized and my answer would be yes based on some specimens I have taken in the Sandcut area where the southern San Joaquin Valley meets the Tehachapi Mts. in Kern County, California. I guess I need to start keeping such examples. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: Anza Borrego Desert State Park January 26-8 2012 From: Fred Heath <fred.heath43 AT gmail.com> Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 22:33:48 -0700 Dear Frank, The spots on the hind wing of the Silvery Blue vary from quite heavy to non-existent. Herb Clarke got a great shot of one with no discernible spotting on the hind wing in Anza-Borrego one spring. It was unusual enough we decided to publish it in our Introduction to So. CA Butterflies book with a more normal individual to show the variation. To Ken's question about Anise occurring in Anza-Borrego the answer is yes. In fact, I've noticed both flying together one day at Montezuma Vista Point, a great hilltopping spot in the transition zone between the desert and chaparral. Once you get down hill on the desert side in the canyons, they all should be Black Swallowtails. If you get a decent look (or better still a photograph) of the dorsal of the butterfly, you can usually tell them apart. The yellow marginal spots on the forewing tend to be round (or at least oval-shaped) on the Black and more like thick dashes on the Anise. Although this mark is not as clear on the underside of the wing, Koji Shiraiwa's The Butterflies of San Diego County shows this difference well. In one of your dorsal Anise photos these marginal spots look more rounded, but it is clearly an Anise (especially because of where you shot it). Even more consistent is the outer edge of the yellow bars which make up the median band. In the Black these bars are rounded concave, while the Anise tends to be either flat on slightly convex. It isn't quite as clear on the ventral, but it does show. Comparing your photos of Anise and Black ventrals shows this plain enough. In the Monroe's Butterflies & Their Favorite Flowering Plants Anza-Borrego Desert State Park (a must for folks visiting the area), they mention the presence of "tiny yellow dots on each side of the abdomen above a lateral yellow band" for the Black Swallowtail. These can be seen in their book photo. They are even more clearly shown in Herb Clarke's cover photo in our So. CA book. ---Best regards, Fred On Mon, Jan 30, 2012 at 12:54 PM, wrote: > ** > > Hi Everyone, > > Further to Pete's excellent report, I have a few addenda: > > [1] A short set of photos may be found at: > > _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157629101531913/_ > (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157629101531913/) > > [2] A couple of these might warrant a second look, so here are links to > specific photos: > > [a] The ventral HW dot spacing on this silvery blue strikes me as a > little unusual: > > > _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790499237/in/set-72157629101531913_ > (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790499237/in/set-72157629101531913) > > > [b] I did get a decent ventral shot of one of those "desert black > swallowtails on January 26 > in Plum Canyon [before Pete arrived on the scene]. Ken Davenport > has raised > the question of whether these could be anise swallowtails. I always > struggle > differentiating between these two, so you tell me: > > _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790495377/in/set-72157629101531913_ > (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790495377/in/set-72157629101531913) > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ From: "John Saba" <sabaj AT theriver.com> Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 17:32:37 -0700 Lepsters, South Fork = South Fork of Cave Creek. A dirt road goes south from the (at that point, paved) Transmountain Road a little bit past the Portal Ranger Station and somewhat downhill from the Southwestern Reaserch Station. It is near many of the most popular campgrounds in the area. BTW, this particular area is (and has been for quite a while) considered a Biologically Sensitive Area, and I believe it's off-limits to collecting. I've been visiting the Chiricahuas somewhat regularly since the day the big fire started. Much habitat remains beautifully intact, some was damaged more or less severely, and some was pretty much devastated. It's been almost 3 months since I've been there, but on my last several visits I noticed a significant amount of new growth in previously damaged areas. In the aftermath of the fire, I think one could expect that certain species will be less prevalent, while others will be more so than usual. I think a general scouting and collecting trip to the area (as opposed to targeting a handful of desired species) could be rewarding personally, as well as gathering scientifically useful data. As Ken has noted previously, people who declined to attend a certain butterfly count in another burn area really missed out on a wonderful experience and good numbers and diversity of bugs. I know that I'll be going back; maybe I'll see you in the field. --- John Saba Tucson, Arizona Nature Study Is a Grand Adventure! ----- Original Message ----- Thanks for the post. I'm not sure where the South Fork Rd. is. What about fire damage? How extensive? Does it look like some things are growing? Such observations are really important to those of us who go to the Chiricahuas. Many of us will also be interested in such reports from the Arizona White Mts. and Huachuca Mtns. as well. Ken Davenport Subject: [SoWestLep] South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ During a 90 minute walk along South Fork Road today my wife and I observed two Spring Azures, a worn Variegated Fritillary, and a stunning Satyr Comma. Tony Godfrey [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Anza Borrego Desert State Park January 26-8 2012 From: fsmodel AT aol.com Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 14:54:26 -0500 (EST) Hi Everyone, Further to Pete's excellent report, I have a few addenda: [1] A short set of photos may be found at: _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157629101531913/_ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157629101531913/) [2] A couple of these might warrant a second look, so here are links to specific photos: [a] The ventral HW dot spacing on this silvery blue strikes me as a little unusual: _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790499237/in/set-72157629101531913_ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790499237/in/set-72157629101531913) [b] I did get a decent ventral shot of one of those "desert black swallowtails on January 26 in Plum Canyon [before Pete arrived on the scene]. Ken Davenport has raised the question of whether these could be anise swallowtails. I always struggle differentiating between these two, so you tell me: _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790495377/in/set-72157629101531913_ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/6790495377/in/set-72157629101531913) [3] On Thursday and Friday [Jan 26-7, before Pete arrived], I had three other species which can be added to our list: Jan 26 sleepy orange [fly-by] gray hairstreak [poor photo, not posted] Jan 27 'Loki' juniper hairstreak [no photo, spent too much time gawking] Cheers, Frank Model Amherst, MA [temporarily Laguna Woods, CA] In a message dated 1/28/2012 8:37:11 P.M. Pacific Standard Time, petespino8 AT yahoo.com writes: I was able to get out to the Colorado Desert today and meet up with Frank Model, who is visiting from Massachusetts. Very dry conditions have left a much different landscape than previous seasons and the usual early wildflower display is non-existent. Recent storms were apparently halted by the mountains to the east and the desert floor is void of it's expected color as a result. The only reliable nectar sources right now are Desert Apricot,and only sporadic pockets of Chuparosa, Desert Lavender, and Deerweed. The weather was sunny and breezy, especially in the afternoon. Good news is that Sonoran Blue (Philotes sonorensis) is having a very good early flight. In fact, this is the earliest date I have ever seen them. Although I'm aware that this is not an early record, I have never observed them in the month of January before today. We saw very good numbers of both males and females, the latter of which were extremely fresh. Two other butterflies observed today having pretty good flights were 'Southern' Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus australis) and Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis sara sara). We explored Plum Canyon,Hellhole Canyon,and the Yaqui Well area from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and observed a grand total of eight species! Other butterflies we targeted but were conspicuously absent were Sleepy Orange, Desert Orangetip, Checkered White, Spring White, Leda Ministreak, Acmon Blue, and Funereal Duskywing. Desert Black Swallowtail (Papilio polyxenes coloro) one Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis cethura) 12-15 Becker's White (Pontia beckerii) 4-5 Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) 6 Western Pygmy Blue (Brephidium exilis) just one Sonoran Blue (Philotes sonorensis) at least 20 Southern Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus australis) ditto Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) one, seen by Frank only Pete Spino San Diego, CA [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 10:53:34 -0800 Tony: Thanks for the post. I'm not sure where the South Fork Rd. is. What about fire damage? How extensive? Does it look like some things are growing? Such observations are really important to those of us who go to the Chiricahuas. Many of us will also be interested in such reports from the Arizona White Mts. and Huachuca Mtns. as well. Ken Davenport Subject: [SoWestLep] South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ During a 90 minute walk along South Fork Road today my wife and I observed two Spring Azures, a worn Variegated Fritillary, and a stunning Satyr Comma. Tony Godfrey [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: California early/late flight periods publication From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 10:46:20 -0800 All: The California early and late flight period publication has been updated through January 24, 2012 and now has common names in addition to the scientific ones. Two early state records recorded January 28th are not in the report: Phyciodes mylitta from Pt. Reyes, Marin County by Jules Evens and Callophrys dumetorum dumetorum ((Coastal Green Hairstreak) from San Francisco by Liam O'Brien. It can be found at the International Lepidoptera Survey website under NEWS items. Make sure you click on the latest version. Thanks Todd Stout for posting that at the website. And thanks to those of you who have donated money to keep that website on line. Common names are given for many subspecies which many believe facilitates getting them listed as protected when these are believed threatened or endangered. Some subspecies names are well used while others are ignored (how many people use subspecies names for Strymon melinus (Gray Hairstreaks?). BOA tends to use only the common name for the whole species and all of its subspecies. A matter of personal preference. Use or don'[t use as you prefer. Some subspecies had no real common name; others were derived from the original descriptions based on the meaning of the scientific name, habitat or geographic range. The common names are often the ones in common usage, often predating the NABA ones. Sometimes, more than one common names are used. The name "Variable Checkerspot" is not used since what is variable to some is three or more species to many of us. Almost all checkerspots are variable. So the names in the paper are Chalcedon, Anicia and Colon Checkerspots. NABA's Bramble Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) included both the Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) and Coastal Green Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) which are two species to many of us. Similar issues occur with the Juniper Hairstreaks complex, Mormon Metalmark complex and Euphilotes blues. So while some ask why we can't have just one list of standardized names, both scientific and common names...the reality is obvious as Jonathan Pelham already explained. There is not agreement in the butterfly community for reasons well discussed on these leps serves in terms of what species to recognize. The early/late publication is a "split" list to facilitate tracking each entity including subspecies or even segregates that may warrant subspecies status. Others are likely synonyms (Plebejus lupini chlorina and P. lupini argentata for example) and will eventually be combined when such beliefs are confirmed. Many of those subspecies names will not be found in your watcher only field guides, or even your collector field guides. They may only be found in technical scientific papers and books. Some subspecies are very distinctive, others not. Some names are probably of very questionable value. The purpose of the early-late paper in not to resolve such issues, but to keep data for each entity until such issues are resolved. You as individuals can split or lump as you like. You can also use the list to see if you found something unusually early or late in the flight periods of these butterflies, if so let me know. But such reports being used may be subject to credibility of the observer, having an actual specimen or a photograph depending on what butterfly and what misidentifications might be a factor. Those were possible factors for many of the records reported so far in 2012. One question for the group. Frank Model and Pete Spino reported a Desert Black Swallowtail in Plum Canyon this January. Those of you who frequent that area...is it only P. polyxenes coloro that occurs there? or do Anise Swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) occur there as well? Such problems are examples of problems confronting record keepers wanting to keep the data straight and accurate. One person asked if P. polyxenes and P. zelicaon ever hybridized and my answer would be yes based on some specimens I have taken in the Sandcut area where the southern San Joaquin Valley meets the Tehachapi Mts. in Kern County, California. I guess I need to start keeping such examples. Ken Davenport Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Weekend Butterflies (1/28-1/29), Orange County, CA From: "Rich Schilk" <birdguy AT naturalista.net> Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 06:06:59 -0000 Modjeska and Harding Canyons - January 28, 2012 Explored a little of Modjeska and Harding Canyon on Saturday. Conditions were windy and warm with not many nectar plants in bloom along the fire road to Flores Peak. On the way back down, I did walk some of the paved road to water tank. Numerous deerweed plants blooming on the hill that the water tank is on. No butterflies seen nectaring on the deerweed but I did get my first Sara Orangetip of the year when one stopped to perch in a sagebrush. Exploring the Tucker Wildlife Sanctuary yielded a Western Tiger Swallowtail. Fullerton Arboretum - Sunday, January 29, 2012 Spent the afternoon at the Fullerton Arboretum trying out my new macro lens. The Channel Islands Garden yielded a new butterfly for me. In the plantings of San Miguel Island Milk-vetch (Astragalus miguelensis), I saw 3-4 Western Tailed-Blues (Everes amyntula) with 2 of them being a mating pair. Other butterflies seen in the Arboretum: Monarch (Danaus plexippus) - 5 Southwestern Cloudless Sulphur (Phoebus sennae) - 1 Rich Schilk Fullerton, CA ------------------------------------ Subject: SEABA Field Trip to Molino Basin 29 Jan From: Fred Heath <fred.heath43 AT gmail.com> Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2012 19:56:29 -0700 Ken Kertell led a SEABA field trip today to Molino Basin in the Santa Catalina Mountains of AZ. On a fairly warm but breezy January (!) day, 19 species were found. The only which one we were surprised to miss was Brown Elfin, especailly since Ken had found a female laying eggs on manzanita a week ago. The list was as follows: Pipevine Swallowtail - (Battus philenor) several Two-Tailed Swallowtail - (Papilio multicaudata) 1 (first of the year for all) Sara Orangetip - (Anthocharis sara) many boys and girls 'Pima' Desert Orangetip - (Anthocharis cethura pima) Southern Dogface - (Zerene cesonia) a few Mexican Yellow - (Eurema mexicana) a few Sleepy Orange - (Abaeis nicippe) a few Dainty Sulphur - (Nathalis iole) 2 Gray Hairstreak - (Strymon melinus) a few 'Echo' Spring Azure - (Celastrina ladon echo) bunches American Snout - (Libytheana carinenta) 1 Tiny Checkerspot - (Dymasia dymas) 1 Texan Crescent - (Anthanassa texana) 1 Common Buckeye - (Junonia coenia) 1 Mourning Cloak - (Nymphalis antiopa) 3 (none seen on SEABA trips is 2011) American Lady - (Vanessa virginiensis) 1 Arizona Powdered-Skipper - (Systasea zampa) 1 Funereal Duskywing - (Erynnis funeralis) 1 Common/White Checkered-Skipper - (Pyrgus communis/albescens) 2 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: South Fork, Chiricahua Mts., se AZ From: "artfullbirds" <artfullbirds AT yahoo.com> Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2012 23:26:47 -0000 During a 90 minute walk along South Fork Road today my wife and I observed two Spring Azures, a worn Variegated Fritillary, and a stunning Satyr Comma. Tony Godfrey ------------------------------------ Subject: Fallbrook, San Diego Co. From: Kojiro Shiraiwa <whiterock AT bekkoame.ne.jp> Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2012 15:24:54 -0800 Hi, A quick visit to Fallbrook, San Diego Co. this morning: Checkered White (Pontia protodice) Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis sara) Southern Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus australis) Echo Azure (Celastrina echo echo) Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa perplexa) Mournful Duskywing (Erynnis tristis tristis) - common I noticed that some of Mournful Duskywings have white margins on underside of the hind wings (and some lacking white markings). One of them had really developed white markings that looks almost like chain of eye-spots. So, now I learned that white fringe is actually part of the eye-spot pattern. Koji San Diego ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: Patagonia Butterfly Garden From: chris kline <kline_at_pine AT yahoo.com> Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2012 12:21:12 -0800 (PST) Negative on both Bob.  It is a book I am writing that documents my Big Butterfly Year of 2011.   chris   Chris Kline Sugar Grove, Ohio Follow my 2011 Big Butterfly Year on Facebook at Butterfly Rider or at http://butterflyrider.blogspot.com/   --- On Sun, 1/29/12, Allen Bob wrote: From: Allen Bob Subject: Re: [SoWestLep] Patagonia Butterfly Garden To: kline_at_pine AT yahoo.com Date: Sunday, January 29, 2012, 9:42 AM Ok, I'll bite. What is a "Butterfly Rider" book? Is it like this: http://tinyurl.com/897h2l Or this: http://tinyurl.com/85rdg9u ? Bob Allen bugbob AT mac.com http://www.boballenphotography.com/ On Jan 29, 2012, at 6:14 AM, chris kline wrote:   Does anybody have a high-resolution photo of the butterfly garden at the city park in Patagonia that I could use for the upcoming Butterfly Rider book.  Of course, photo credit will be given.  THX   chris     [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Patagonia Butterfly Garden From: chris kline <kline_at_pine AT yahoo.com> Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2012 06:14:35 -0800 (PST) Does anybody have a high-resolution photo of the butterfly garden at the city park in Patagonia that I could use for the upcoming Butterfly Rider book.  Of course, photo credit will be given.  THX   chris     [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Otay Lake, San Diego Co. From: Kojiro Shiraiwa <whiterock AT bekkoame.ne.jp> Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2012 21:04:40 -0800 Hi Western Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio rutulus) was out flying in Otay Lake, San Diego Co. today. Also saw my first Sara Orangetip for this year! Koji San Diego ------------------------------------ Subject: Anza-Borrego Desert State Park From: "Pete" <petespino8 AT yahoo.com> Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2012 04:37:05 -0000 I was able to get out to the Colorado Desert today and meet up with Frank Model, who is visiting from Massachusetts. Very dry conditions have left a much different landscape than previous seasons and the usual early wildflower display is non-existent. Recent storms were apparently halted by the mountains to the east and the desert floor is void of it's expected color as a result. The only reliable nectar sources right now are Desert Apricot,and only sporadic pockets of Chuparosa, Desert Lavender, and Deerweed. The weather was sunny and breezy, especially in the afternoon. Good news is that Sonoran Blue (Philotes sonorensis) is having a very good early flight. In fact, this is the earliest date I have ever seen them. Although I'm aware that this is not an early record, I have never observed them in the month of January before today. We saw very good numbers of both males and females, the latter of which were extremely fresh. Two other butterflies observed today having pretty good flights were 'Southern' Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus australis) and Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis sara sara). We explored Plum Canyon,Hellhole Canyon,and the Yaqui Well area from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and observed a grand total of eight species! Other butterflies we targeted but were conspicuously absent were Sleepy Orange, Desert Orangetip, Checkered White, Spring White, Leda Ministreak, Acmon Blue, and Funereal Duskywing. Desert Black Swallowtail (Papilio polyxenes coloro) one Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis cethura) 12-15 Becker's White (Pontia beckerii) 4-5 Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) 6 Western Pygmy Blue (Brephidium exilis) just one Sonoran Blue (Philotes sonorensis) at least 20 Southern Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus australis) ditto Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) one, seen by Frank only Pete Spino San Diego, CA ------------------------------------ Subject: PRESEASON SCOUTING REPORT From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2012 12:48:34 -0800 Everyone: Richard Meyer and I did a scouting trip yesterday (January 26th) to evaluate butterfly and general insect prospects for the coming season. This followed two fairly decent storm systems that left rain in the Mojave Desert, southern San Joaquin Valley and the southern Sierra in Kern and Tulare Counties California. No butterflies were seen anywhere. Comments: Mojave Desert at southern end of Sierra Nevada north of Hwy. 14 west of Jawbone Canyon, Kern County: Appears dry with very little new plant growth. There is moisure under the surface and some grass growth on NE facing slopes. Jawbone Canyon, Kern County. Very dry, similar conditions to above. Butterbredt Peak, Kern County: had very heavy rains (no snow on the ground) but the dirt road connecting Jawbone Canyon with Kelso Valley was very wet with mud puddles and evidence that there had been gully washes. So we should have indra and P. polyxenes coloro flying again in 2012. Kelso Valley north to Sageland: Wet with mud puddles. No new plant growth of consequence seen. Piute Mountains: Sparse snow cover above 6500'. East slope wet with recent rains. Weldon-Lake Isabella: No visible plant growth except in some wet meadows. Sierra Nevada to the north: No snow visible on the south end of the Kern Plateau even at 8000' Further north towards Sherman Pass looking from Lake Isabella, snow was visible at above the 8000' level. Greenhorn Mts.: Wet but no snow seen looking at the peaks from the east. Kern River Canyon: green grass growing along roadsides with runoff from rocky slopes, but open slopes showed little green. The insect count was only a few flies, three wasps and an ant. There was a fair amount of bird activity and Dick saw a deer in an orange grove as we exited Kern Canyon heading for Bakersfield. Several ground squirrels or chipmonks were seen. The future forecast is for dry weather. Rainfall in this region to date is about half normal and about 30% of last year. Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: SE AZ: Molino Basin, Santa Catalina Mts. From: "Ken" <teleost07 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2012 23:19:56 -0000 Here's an update on butterfly activity today (January 26) during a halfday trip with Jim Brock to Molino Basin, Santa Catalina Mts (Pima Co.), where temperatures reached the low 70s today. Sagebrush Checkerspot (Chlosyne acastus sabina) 1 last instar larva partially hidden near the base of the food plant, tansyaster (Dieteria asteroides), which is doing well this spring. `Pima' Desert Orangetip (Anthocharis cethura pima) 6 hilltopping at 1:30 PM near milepost 2, Catalina Highway (also known as Mount Lemmon Highway) during return trip. Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis sara inghami) 10, picking up steam in terms of abundance. Pipevine Swallowtail (Battus p. philenor) 13 Dainty Sulphur (Nathalis i. iole) 7 Mexican Yellow (Eurema mexicana) 3 Sleepy Orange (Abaeis nicippe) 4 Gray Hairstreak (Strymon melinus franki) 3 Mourning Cloak (Nymphalis a. antiopa) 1 Southwestern Azure (Celastrina echo cinerea) Abundant Ken Kertell Tucson ------------------------------------ Subject: Common names in California paper From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2012 09:25:39 -0800 Everyone: I am currently working on getting out the updated California early-late electronic downloadable publication found at the TILS website under NEWS. We do that every year. I am adding common English names to facilitate folks who do not use scientific names. This will include many names for subspecies, but not all subspecies really have accepted common names and in such cases use of the common names for the species will usually do. So not all named subspecies will have a common name in the paper. Most will. There is no reason anyone has to accept subspecies names, using the same common name as the species is fine. It's personal choice. There are no universal rules for common names which may be a good thing because a LOT of skippers have "Sierra" or "Sierran" in their common names. Some previously used common names may not be usable or present special problems since applications of some scientific names have reversed and the old common names would now apply to the wrong taxon. Example: James Scott's switch of Hesperia "comma" yosemite with Hesperia "comma" harpalus and Hesperia "comma" idaho. The common name of Yosemite Skipper might still reflect what occurs at Yosemite. What was called the Harpalus Skipper might now be called the "Great Basin Branded Skipper" or "Idaho Skipper". Scientific names used don't follow Pelham's Catalogue. They more closely follow the TILS names choices. Some subspecies recognized in our listing may in actuality be synonyms, not different enough to continue to recognize them as different. Species names recognized are more "split" than what others may choose to recognize. In my view (and that of Ray Stanford and Robert Langston), this facilitates keeping the dates kept separate for distinctive entities regardless of what the relationships actually turn out to be in the most correct sense. The purpose of the publication is not to make taxonomic decisions, it is to present flight period dates for the entities involved. As usual, there are a LOT of new early and late records. People have been great in letting me know their new records. Some broke their own records. Others will cry when they learn someone beat their record. I thought Brian Banker's February 1 record for a Pale Swallowtail (Papilio eurymedon) would last but someone went out there and got a photo on January 13th in the same Orange County Brian got his. So I hope to get this all done in the next couple of weeks. Ken Davenport [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: Hesperia pahaska near pahaska From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2012 23:09:47 -0800 Everyone: I forwarded a "Collection Record" section I did as part of my write up for the Pahaska Skipper for several reasons and won't be doing so as a regular practice. This was something I just did for my own purposes, updating my records for this particular skipper done back in 1995, records since then were not in my past typewritten report. My other information was still accurate so I just added this updated section to my documentation....Hesperia pahaska williamsi was done separately years ago and was unchanged. This followed a review of my pahaska series in my collection earlier today. What are some reasons I forwarded this to the group? (1). Some of you may be interested in the information of where and when to find this particular butterfly. (2) One recent post mentioned we should use the authors name in using scientific names and it is so done in my personal reports that might end up being reviewed by scientists, but more so for my own benefit. Actually, unless you are writing a formal scientific paper or article, using authors names is not required and it is not required in personal notes or making posts to leps serves (thank goodness!). (3) Documentation of your work whether you collect, watch or photograph. Such information may help you recall your experience with a certain species or subspecies and facilitate sharing information with others. The late Chis Henne has his collection notes at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles and I had a chance to go through a small part of that. Amazing and important information. Arthur Shapiro just wrote a write up of the life of a moth lepidopterists who made very valuable contributions by sending his noteworthy collection to the UC Davis collection. I had never heard of him, maybe Kelly Richers has. But Shapiro was obviously concerned that person had no collection notes or documentation for his collection other than the labelled moths themselves. One person on a leps serve recently reported he had 58 years experience of collecting insects, yet I have seen no published articles or published data for any of this work, though he reportedly has collected two million insects. Some keep reports for each trip. In my case, I keep several binders worth of notes for each kind of butterfly I have in my collection. Not for moths yet. I don't even know what most of those are! Except my Annaphila moths thanks to an excellent article with color photos by Ron Leuschener. Anyway, not all care if such information is preserved or passed on to others should the end of our lives come. But I personally think that it is good to pass on such information to others. Museums do keep such notes if the person is credible, productive and knew what he was doing. In my case, I use such information a lot now when I am alive. And I hope to keep it that way for many years to come! Ken Davenport PAHASKA SKIPPER Hesperia pahaska near pahaska (Leussler) Collection Records: Arizona: Coconino County: San Francisco Peaks area NE of Schultz Pass off Schultz Pass Rd. connecting Schultz Pass with Hwy. 89 to Sunset Craters and Lockett Lakes Rd. area, many taken on hillside with tall grasses where pahaska was sympatric with Hesperia viridis. July 10, 1995. Also taken sparingly on roadside flowers on Lockett Lakes Rd. July 6, 2007. Flagstaff 7300' on hilltop where the observatory is, several adults on lantana (with Poladryas arachne arachne) at the observatory June 16, 2000. Also common off the Mormon Lakes Rd. south of Flagstaff June 13, 2000. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 14:10:15 -0800 Good Points Ray. Yes, draco adults often show similarities to sabuleti on the upperside, less so below. Yes, they seem related at some level. And there is the possibility that sabuleti subspecies albamontana and tecumseh may be species in their own right. Ken Davenport Subject: Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Happy new year to Ken, Richard, your families, and all others - The relationship between P. sabuleti and P. draco has been of historic interest and controversy. Evans found them to be so similar, including the male genitalia (his drawings are based on crushed specimens, so somewhat distorted), that he lumped them as one species in his classic work on Hesperiidae in 1955. The best review I know of since then is that by my old, late, friend, C. Don MacNeill, in J. Lepid Soc 47 (3): pp. 177-181, 1993 (the paper is longer, but not relevant to this except for the references). The LACM collection contains long series of these skippers from northern Arizona, collected by Lloyd Martin, Fred Truxell, Charles Hogue and others during the first half of the 20th century. While a grad student at UCLA in the 1960s, I spent a couple of days looking at these specimens. There were undoubted P. draco from both rims of the Grand Canyon and from the San Francisco Peaks, but the material from further south, although superficially intermediate, was clearly closer to P. sabuleti, so agrees with what Rich wrote. The two species are still considered to be distinct by most of us, and are so treated in the Pelham catalogue. Over the 40 years I lived and collected in Colorado and Utah, I found several populations which seemed intermediate, usually from around 7-8000' elevation, but Andy Warren determined these specimens as sabuleti. So questions remain, but for now, they remain related but distinct species. Cheers, Ray Stanford On Jan 13, 2012, at 1:57 PM, wrote: > Everyone: > > Richard Bailowitz contacted me and revealed there are no known populations > of Draco Skippers (Polites draco) around Mormon Lakes, Coconino County, > Arizona, but there are records around there for Sandhill Skippers (Polites > sabuleti). I pulled my series of Polites draco this AM and ALL are much > darker and different than my problem skipper. So sabuleti it must be. > > While sabuleti tend to be lowlanders, subspecies in the Sierra Nevada > (tecumseh) and California White Mts.(albomontana) occur up to at least > 12,000'. I actually visited the Mormon Lakes last June 3rd in the hopes I > would find more of these skippers but high winds and low temperatures cut > my efforts short. I also intended to try it again last July but a major > rainstorm ended those plans. > > Thanks guys for the input and the elevation Hank! I have also seen some > other choice species around Mormon Lakes: Papilio (machaon) bairdii, > Chlosyne fulvia and even a couple Speyeria nokomis...none of which I > actually caught. > > Ken Davenport > > I have Googled the elevation of Mormon Lake at 7399". > > Hank Brodkin > > Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? > > Thanks Jim and Todd: > > Mormon Lakes is probably about 6500', just a guess. I checked the > "diagnostic" mark of the HW that is supposed to be jagged and it is but > some > sabuleti at BOA look similar. I have 24 Polites draco in my collection > from > Arizona (Greer), Colorado and Wyoming. Some of those males seem similar to > the Mormon Lakes individual male but I still can't rule out sabuleti. I > looked at the draco series BEFORE I checked the problem bug, and will have > to recheck. Most draco are much different than the specimen in question. > > I am hoping someone is familiar with the Mormon Lake problem skipper and > has a series to determine my oddball individual. It does not fit any known > population (subspecies) of sabuleti, but some come close enough to avoid > ruling those out. This specimen is not nominate sabuleti or chusca. > > Ken Davenport > ----- > > Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? > > Ken > > I would say draco. Check for the field mark on draco. > > Jim > > In a message dated 1/12/2012 5:55:51 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, > kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com writes: > > Everyone: > > I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. > south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others > I > believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I > had > an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking > again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites > draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? > > Best Wishes, Ken Davenport > kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > ------------------------------------ > > Keywords: DesertLeps , Desert Leps , Desert Lepidoptera , Desert > Butterflies > , Desert Moths Subject: Re: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: Ray Stanford <ray.stanford AT stanfordalumni.org> Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 19:43:42 -0800 Happy new year to Ken, Richard, your families, and all others - The relationship between P. sabuleti and P. draco has been of historic interest and controversy. Evans found them to be so similar, including the male genitalia (his drawings are based on crushed specimens, so somewhat distorted), that he lumped them as one species in his classic work on Hesperiidae in 1955. The best review I know of since then is that by my old, late, friend, C. Don MacNeill, in J. Lepid Soc 47 (3): pp. 177-181, 1993 (the paper is longer, but not relevant to this except for the references). The LACM collection contains long series of these skippers from northern Arizona, collected by Lloyd Martin, Fred Truxell, Charles Hogue and others during the first half of the 20th century. While a grad student at UCLA in the 1960s, I spent a couple of days looking at these specimens. There were undoubted P. draco from both rims of the Grand Canyon and from the San Francisco Peaks, but the material from further south, although superficially intermediate, was clearly closer to P. sabuleti, so agrees with what Rich wrote. The two species are still considered to be distinct by most of us, and are so treated in the Pelham catalogue. Over the 40 years I lived and collected in Colorado and Utah, I found several populations which seemed intermediate, usually from around 7-8000' elevation, but Andy Warren determined these specimens as sabuleti. So questions remain, but for now, they remain related but distinct species. Cheers, Ray Stanford On Jan 13, 2012, at 1:57 PM, wrote: > Everyone: > > Richard Bailowitz contacted me and revealed there are no known populations of Draco Skippers (Polites draco) around Mormon Lakes, Coconino County, Arizona, but there are records around there for Sandhill Skippers (Polites sabuleti). I pulled my series of Polites draco this AM and ALL are much darker and different than my problem skipper. So sabuleti it must be. > > While sabuleti tend to be lowlanders, subspecies in the Sierra Nevada (tecumseh) and California White Mts.(albomontana) occur up to at least 12,000'. I actually visited the Mormon Lakes last June 3rd in the hopes I would find more of these skippers but high winds and low temperatures cut my efforts short. I also intended to try it again last July but a major rainstorm ended those plans. > > Thanks guys for the input and the elevation Hank! I have also seen some other choice species around Mormon Lakes: Papilio (machaon) bairdii, Chlosyne fulvia and even a couple Speyeria nokomis...none of which I actually caught. > > Ken Davenport > > I have Googled the elevation of Mormon Lake at 7399". > > Hank Brodkin > > Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? > > Thanks Jim and Todd: > > Mormon Lakes is probably about 6500', just a guess. I checked the > "diagnostic" mark of the HW that is supposed to be jagged and it is but some > sabuleti at BOA look similar. I have 24 Polites draco in my collection from > Arizona (Greer), Colorado and Wyoming. Some of those males seem similar to > the Mormon Lakes individual male but I still can't rule out sabuleti. I > looked at the draco series BEFORE I checked the problem bug, and will have > to recheck. Most draco are much different than the specimen in question. > > I am hoping someone is familiar with the Mormon Lake problem skipper and > has a series to determine my oddball individual. It does not fit any known > population (subspecies) of sabuleti, but some come close enough to avoid > ruling those out. This specimen is not nominate sabuleti or chusca. > > Ken Davenport > ----- > > Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? > > Ken > > I would say draco. Check for the field mark on draco. > > Jim > > In a message dated 1/12/2012 5:55:51 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, > kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com writes: > > Everyone: > > I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. > south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others I > believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I had > an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking > again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites > draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? > > Best Wishes, Ken Davenport > kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > ------------------------------------ > > Keywords: DesertLeps , Desert Leps , Desert Lepidoptera , Desert Butterflies > , Desert Moths Subject: RE: SE AZ butterfly sightings in the past few days From: Todd Stout <todd_stout29 AT hotmail.com> Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 10:37:25 -0700 JB, I checked my cethura pima app on my iPhone and they're not scheduled to emerge until Friday. ;) Todd Todd L. Stout Utah Lepidopterists' Society http://www.utahlepsociety.org/toddstout.html todd_stout29 AT hotmail.com 801-558-6302 TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" 1999 To: munchita AT msn.com; sowestlep AT yahoogroups.com From: JimJoanJoy AT aol.com Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 12:34:25 -0500 Subject: Re: [SoWestLep] SE AZ butterfly sightings in the past few days Checking my yard this morning I see some stalks on my silverbell mustards. Desert Orangetips should be starting to emerge. Jim B In a message dated 1/16/2012 8:39:55 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, munchita AT msn.com writes: After learning of Ken Kertell's Friday sighting of a Sara Orangetip at Molino Basin, we quickly called a field trip for Sunday 1/14/12. On Saturday, Fred Heath & I walked in Sabino Canyon and saw our first Sara Orangetip of the season, a male. We also found very nice rock cress plants, including some blooming. Later that day Doug Mullins told us he had also seen one male Sara out west of the Tucson Mountains. Sunday was mostly overcast and cool at Molino Basin, and we were lucky to find one Spring Azure on a oak tree. However, we did notice the manzanita bushes are flowering and budding, so we believe Brown Elfins should be out. We'll look again on the next sunny day. Last night we received 4/10 inch of rain at our house, which should really help the wildflowers. Mary Klinkel, Tucson AZ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: SE AZ butterfly sightings in the past few days From: JimJoanJoy AT aol.com Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 12:34:25 -0500 (EST) Checking my yard this morning I see some stalks on my silverbell mustards. Desert Orangetips should be starting to emerge. Jim B In a message dated 1/16/2012 8:39:55 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, munchita AT msn.com writes: After learning of Ken Kertell's Friday sighting of a Sara Orangetip at Molino Basin, we quickly called a field trip for Sunday 1/14/12. On Saturday, Fred Heath & I walked in Sabino Canyon and saw our first Sara Orangetip of the season, a male. We also found very nice rock cress plants, including some blooming. Later that day Doug Mullins told us he had also seen one male Sara out west of the Tucson Mountains. Sunday was mostly overcast and cool at Molino Basin, and we were lucky to find one Spring Azure on a oak tree. However, we did notice the manzanita bushes are flowering and budding, so we believe Brown Elfins should be out. We'll look again on the next sunny day. Last night we received 4/10 inch of rain at our house, which should really help the wildflowers. Mary Klinkel, Tucson AZ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: SE AZ butterfly sightings in the past few days From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:39:47 +0100 After learning of Ken Kertell's Friday sighting of a Sara Orangetip at Molino Basin, we quickly called a field trip for Sunday 1/14/12. On Saturday, Fred Heath & I walked in Sabino Canyon and saw our first Sara Orangetip of the season, a male. We also found very nice rock cress plants, including some blooming. Later that day Doug Mullins told us he had also seen one male Sara out west of the Tucson Mountains. Sunday was mostly overcast and cool at Molino Basin, and we were lucky to find one Spring Azure on a oak tree. However, we did notice the manzanita bushes are flowering and budding, so we believe Brown Elfins should be out. We'll look again on the next sunny day. Last night we received 4/10 inch of rain at our house, which should really help the wildflowers. Mary Klinkel, Tucson AZ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: SoCal spring From: Kojiro Shiraiwa <whiterock AT bekkoame.ne.jp> Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2012 21:09:25 -0800 Hi all, Just want to thank you for people who shared their SoCal spring butterfly sightings with me. It is amazing 24 species are now flying in JANUARY and many of them are early records. Here are list of butterflies already on their wings from L.A Co. to San Diego Co., CA (compiled my records and other people's records - I am not going to write their names). I bet we can find more. Anyway, it is very unusual year and thought I'd share this info with everyone. Fiery Skipper (Hylephila phyleus) Umber Skipper (Poanes melane) Anise Swallowtail (Papilio zelicaon) Pale Swallowtail (Papilio eurymedon) California Dogface (Zerene eurydice) Southwestern Cloudless Sulphur (Phoebus sennae) Sara Orangetip (Anthocharis sara) Cabbage White (Pieris rapae) Checkered White (Pontia protodice) Western Great Purple Hairstreak (Atlides halesus) Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa) Western Elfin (Callophrys augustinus) Common Gray Hairstreak (Strymon melinus) Western Tailed Blue (Cupido amyntula) Echo Azure (Celastrina echo) Southern Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus) Acmon Blue (Plebejus acmon) Marine Blue (Leptotes marina) Monarch (Danaus plexippus) Gulf Fritillary (Agraulis vanillae) American Lady (Vanessa virginiensis) Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) West Coast Lady (Vanessa annabella) American Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) Mourning Cloak (Nymphalis antiopa) It's finally raining today in San Diego. Hope it will continue to rain so we will have good spring and summer season. Koji San Diego ------------------------------------ Subject: Early California Butterflies From: fsmodel AT aol.com Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 00:02:37 -0500 (EST) Hi Folks, The weather here in Orange and LA Counties has been mild [70's] and sunny. I would call it "early spring", except that this would acknowledge that the slightly cooler conditions that normally obtain along the coast deserve to be called "winter". Sue and I have been here since January 5 and I have booked 15 species [not bad for early January]: American lady anise swallowtail cabbage white checkered white gray hairstreak great purple hairstreak [California early record - January 13] marine blue monarch painted lady perplexing HS red admiral umber skipper [LA County] [California early record - January 8] west coast lady western brown elfin yellow pierid [distant fly-by, probably California dogface] Amusingly, the early record I broke for great purple hairstreak was my own. I was able to get photos [of varying quality] of twelve species [missing only cabbage white, red admiral, yellow pierid], which can be viewed at: _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157628884618039/_ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157628884618039/) It rained today. Much needed, but it will put a damper on the butterflies for a day or two. Cheers, Frank [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2012 13:57:29 -0800 Everyone: Richard Bailowitz contacted me and revealed there are no known populations of Draco Skippers (Polites draco) around Mormon Lakes, Coconino County, Arizona, but there are records around there for Sandhill Skippers (Polites sabuleti). I pulled my series of Polites draco this AM and ALL are much darker and different than my problem skipper. So sabuleti it must be. While sabuleti tend to be lowlanders, subspecies in the Sierra Nevada (tecumseh) and California White Mts.(albomontana) occur up to at least 12,000'. I actually visited the Mormon Lakes last June 3rd in the hopes I would find more of these skippers but high winds and low temperatures cut my efforts short. I also intended to try it again last July but a major rainstorm ended those plans. Thanks guys for the input and the elevation Hank! I have also seen some other choice species around Mormon Lakes: Papilio (machaon) bairdii, Chlosyne fulvia and even a couple Speyeria nokomis...none of which I actually caught. Ken Davenport I have Googled the elevation of Mormon Lake at 7399". Hank Brodkin Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Thanks Jim and Todd: Mormon Lakes is probably about 6500', just a guess. I checked the "diagnostic" mark of the HW that is supposed to be jagged and it is but some sabuleti at BOA look similar. I have 24 Polites draco in my collection from Arizona (Greer), Colorado and Wyoming. Some of those males seem similar to the Mormon Lakes individual male but I still can't rule out sabuleti. I looked at the draco series BEFORE I checked the problem bug, and will have to recheck. Most draco are much different than the specimen in question. I am hoping someone is familiar with the Mormon Lake problem skipper and has a series to determine my oddball individual. It does not fit any known population (subspecies) of sabuleti, but some come close enough to avoid ruling those out. This specimen is not nominate sabuleti or chusca. Ken Davenport ----- Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Ken I would say draco. Check for the field mark on draco. Jim In a message dated 1/12/2012 5:55:51 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com writes: Everyone: I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others I believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I had an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Keywords: DesertLeps , Desert Leps , Desert Lepidoptera , Desert Butterflies , Desert Moths Subject: SEAZ Molino Basin sara From: "Ken" <teleost07 AT yahoo.com> Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2012 21:20:05 -0000 A single fresh male Sara Orangetip (Anthocaris sara inghami) was basking in Molino Basin this morning (13 January). Yikes. Also on the wing were Pipevine Swallowtail (Battus p. philenor), Southwestern Azure (Celastrina echo cinerea), and Dainty Sulphur (Nathalis i. iole). Point-leaf Manzanita (Arctostaphylos pungens) is just beginning to bloom. Ken Kertell Tucson ------------------------------------ Subject: RE: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: "Mark Walker" <xvermontrz AT att.net> Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2012 07:16:05 -0800 Ken, As I recall, I got into a good number of Polites draco in the Green's Peak area (~10,000 ft.) back in June 2007. I had hoped they were Hesperia viridis, but I think they turned out to be P. draco. - quite a bit darker than sabuleti. Mark From: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Sent: Thursday, January 12, 2012 4:56 PM To: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com Subject: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Everyone: I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others I believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I had an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" C 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: RE:sive/gryneus and Pratt's article on the hairsteaks From: "Steve Cary" <sjcary AT earthlink.net> Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2012 05:37:48 -0700 Ken, Steve, at al., Thanks for your feedback in the siva/gryneus question. I had forgotten about the seam in Nebraska. Not being particularly literate when to comes to genetic matters, my view is probably a pretty simplistic one. However, the area in west TX and SE NM where these two critters overlap and have opportunity to interbreed is fairly extensive, covers multiple large counties, and certainly includes the Davis Mtns. Additional study there would be worthwhile. Steve Cary _____ From: SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Steve Spomer Sent: Friday, December 16, 2011 1:39 PM To: TILS-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com Subject: [SoWestLep] Pratt's article on the hairsteaks Ken, all: This paper seems to provide good evidence of separate species status of M. siva and M. gryneus, something I've been saying for years based on observations here in Nebraska. Yes, there are siva/gryneus intermediates known from Nebraska (I have a few in my collection), but they are restricted to one county (Dawson), where eastern red cedar (typical gryneus host) and juniper (siva host) hybridize, and they are uncommon. I have always regarded this as a suture zone rather than an intergrade zone because it is such a small area where these intermediates occur. As far as what is happening in New Mexico and west Texas, I cannot address this. I have a small series of gryneus/siva intermediates from the Davis Mts. in W Texas collected by Jere Kuhn. Perhaps they have formed a stable hybrid zone there and in New Mexico? Does anyone know the distribution of these intermediates in New Mexico and Texas? Are they found over a large area or a narrow zone? Harry makes a good point about hybrids in Limenitis. Not only are there frequent hybrids between L. weidemeyerii and L. lorquini in the Mono Lake area, but there have been several hybrids between L. (arthemis) astyanax and L. weidemeyerii and between L. weidemeyerii and L. archippus collected in the Niobrara River Valley here in Nebraska. Only a mega-lumper would suggest that these are conspecific. Steve Spomer Univ. Nebraska Entomology No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2012.0.1890 / Virus Database: 2108/4684 - Release Date: 12/16/11 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: "Hank Brodkin" <hbrodkin AT cox.net> Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2012 03:08:23 -0700 I have Googled the elevation of Mormon Lake at 7399". Hank Brodkin Carr Canyon, Cochise County, AZ 31°26’59.8â€�N 110°16’02.8â€�W hbrodkin AT cox.net "Butterflies of Arizona - a Photographic Guide" "Finding Butterflies in Arizona - a Guide to the Best Sites" -----Original Message----- From: kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Sent: Friday, January 13, 2012 12:23 AM To: SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com ; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Thanks Jim and Todd: Mormon Lakes is probably about 6500', just a guess. I checked the "diagnostic" mark of the HW that is supposed to be jagged and it is but some sabuleti at BOA look similar. I have 24 Polites draco in my collection from Arizona (Greer), Colorado and Wyoming. Some of those males seem similar to the Mormon Lakes individual male but I still can't rule out sabuleti. I looked at the draco series BEFORE I checked the problem bug, and will have to recheck. Most draco are much different than the specimen in question. I am hoping someone is familiar with the Mormon Lake problem skipper and has a series to determine my oddball individual. It does not fit any known population (subspecies) of sabuleti, but some come close enough to avoid ruling those out. This specimen is not nominate sabuleti or chusca. Ken Davenport ----- Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Ken I would say draco. Check for the field mark on draco. Jim In a message dated 1/12/2012 5:55:51 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com writes: Everyone: I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others I believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I had an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Keywords: DesertLeps , Desert Leps , Desert Lepidoptera , Desert Butterflies , Desert Moths Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2012 23:23:25 -0800 Thanks Jim and Todd: Mormon Lakes is probably about 6500', just a guess. I checked the "diagnostic" mark of the HW that is supposed to be jagged and it is but some sabuleti at BOA look similar. I have 24 Polites draco in my collection from Arizona (Greer), Colorado and Wyoming. Some of those males seem similar to the Mormon Lakes individual male but I still can't rule out sabuleti. I looked at the draco series BEFORE I checked the problem bug, and will have to recheck. Most draco are much different than the specimen in question. I am hoping someone is familiar with the Mormon Lake problem skipper and has a series to determine my oddball individual. It does not fit any known population (subspecies) of sabuleti, but some come close enough to avoid ruling those out. This specimen is not nominate sabuleti or chusca. Ken Davenport ----- Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Ken I would say draco. Check for the field mark on draco. Jim In a message dated 1/12/2012 5:55:51 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com writes: Everyone: I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others I believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I had an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: RE: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: Todd Stout <todd_stout29 AT hotmail.com> Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2012 18:33:50 -0700 Hi Ken, Forgive me for commenting when I can't guarantee a correct answer; but, do you mind if I ask the elevation of Mormon Lakes? How many did you collect? How common were they? Can you provide a rudimentary digital image? I'm more familiar with Mormons from Salt Lake than Mormon Lakes from AZ; but my experience with these two taxa in the mountains of Northern and Southern Utah suggests that P. draco tends to be much more locally common and flies at much higher elevations than P. sabuleti. Also, the vhw disk (if you will) of Southern Utah P. draco males is dark green; contrasted to yellow on males of P. sabuleti chusca and other ssp. of P. sabuleti. I realize there may be subspecific variation in either or both taxa that fly south of Flag; which renders Utah material to be of limited value. Thx, Todd Todd L. Stout Utah Lepidopterists' Society http://www.utahlepsociety.org/toddstout.html todd_stout29 AT hotmail.com 801-558-6302 TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" 1999 To: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com From: kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2012 16:55:43 -0800 Subject: [DesertLeps] Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? Everyone: I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others I believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I had an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Polites sabuleti or draco at Mormon Lakes? From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2012 16:55:43 -0800 Everyone: I have an odd Polites male I collected along the Mormon Lakes Loop Rd. south of Flagstaff in Coconino County on 13 June 2000. A couple of others I believed were sabuleti went to museums. All this time I have believed I had an unusual population of Sandhill Skipper (Polites sabuleti), but looking again at this specimen...I believe it may be a Draco Skipper (Polites draco). Is anyone familiar with which is at the Mormon Lakes? Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 From: Bruce Walsh <jbwalsh AT u.arizona.edu> Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2012 15:16:03 -0700 My fellow Tucsonians should try mothing -- I had over a dozen species on 1 Jan in traps set at the base of the Santa Catalinas, including a small series of a rare geo and another example (up to six now) of a big (so-far) undescribed Noctuid. ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 From: JimJoanJoy AT aol.com Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:11:46 -0500 (EST) Noah, Lysides overwinter as adults so they can be seen anytime during the winter as long as one has a warm day. They are not as often encountered north of the border during winter months because they are hundreds of miles from their breeding grounds in centrsl Sonora, Mexico and do not do as well as other native sulphurs mainly for that fact plus they are less tolerant of cold winter temperatures. Ornamental plantings of Guiacum coulteri allow some breeding to occur in SE AZ following their unpredictable summer influx which usually begins in July. I have had adult Lysides successfully overwinter in my yard in Tucson but only once every ten years or so. One year after a series of very cold nights I found two dead adults still frozen to their perch. On that same plant I found another adult that had survived. I believe the overnight temps were in the mid 20's. Jim Brock In a message dated 1/11/2012 1:04:46 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, loriarthur61 AT yahoo.com writes: While looking through old papered specimens in my cupboard, I rediscovered a fresh female LYSIDE SULFUR that I caught on January 1, 2009, in Casa Blanca Canyon, AZ. I'm not sure exactly where Casa Blanca Canyon is or what county it is in, but I do remember the catch. The butterfly was caught while floating swallowtail-like down the canyon in fairly warm conditions, and I also remember seeing two PAINTED LADIES on this occasion. Is January 1 an unusual date for a Lyside in southeast Arizona? Noah Arthur, Oakland, CA [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 From: "Ken" <teleost07 AT yahoo.com> Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2012 22:00:16 -0000 Lori: Judy Winslow here in Tucson had a record on January 19, also in 2009. Ken Kertell Tucson ------------------------------------ Subject: Lyside Sulfur from January 1, 2009 From: Lori Arthur <loriarthur61 AT yahoo.com> Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2012 10:30:25 -0800 (PST) While looking through old papered specimens in my cupboard, I rediscovered a fresh female LYSIDE SULFUR that I caught on January 1, 2009, in Casa Blanca Canyon, AZ. I'm not sure exactly where Casa Blanca Canyon is or what county it is in, but I do remember the catch. The butterfly was caught while floating swallowtail-like down the canyon in fairly warm conditions, and I also remember seeing two PAINTED LADIES on this occasion. Is January 1 an unusual date for a Lyside in southeast Arizona?   Noah Arthur, Oakland, CA [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: NE Tucson AZ: first butterfly of 2012 From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:48:54 +0100 Yesterday, Jan. 10, 2012, my first butterfly of the year emerged in my kitchen, a beautiful female queen. She is currently resting on milkweed in the backyard, waiting to warm up enough to fly today. She pupated on Dec. 25, 2011. Mary Klinkel Tucson, AZ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Spring in San Diego (early records?) From: Pete Spino <petespino8 AT yahoo.com> Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2012 17:02:13 -0800 (PST) Good thinking Koji! I was hoping for someone to head down to Otay Mountain since I cannot presently. A good place too now, as you already know, for Anthocharis is probably the westernmost desert canyons in ABDSP. Some early cethura could be out already. This weekend is perhaps a good time to go. Frank from Massachusetts should be out too. Pete ________________________________ From: Kojiro Shiraiwa To: SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; desertleps AT yahoogroups.com Sent: Sunday, January 8, 2012 9:12 PM Subject: [DesertLeps] Spring in San Diego (early records?)   Hi all, After days of day time temperature around 70-80 degrees, I was eager to get out to the field to see if I could find Sara Orangetip. Last week I spent couple of hours in Penasquitos Canyon in San Diego Co, but even with very warm temperature, I was not able to find a single butterfly. Today, I decided to think like a butterfly and headed to a small hill in Otay Mountain. Otay Mountain usually has early flight for many species. The temperature was at 60, with clear sky. Hills are green and flowers (Deerweed, Buckwheat, Bladderpod, Lilac, Sunflowers, etc) were blooming, but I was not able to find Sara Orangetip. However, on the hilltops, I was able to find following butterflies. Echo Azure (Celastina echo echo) x10+ already worn & torn Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa perplexa) x3 bit worn Southern Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus australis) x1 fresh Unknown Nymphalid (probably Vanessa) x1 fly by So, the spring butterflies have started their flight in San Diego Co. And their condition tells me they have been flying for few days already. Sara must be flying somewhere in SoCal !! We need little bit more of rain though… Koji San Diego [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Spring in San Diego (early records?) From: Kojiro Shiraiwa <whiterock AT bekkoame.ne.jp> Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2012 21:12:47 -0800 Hi all, After days of day time temperature around 70-80 degrees, I was eager to get out to the field to see if I could find Sara Orangetip. Last week I spent couple of hours in Penasquitos Canyon in San Diego Co, but even with very warm temperature, I was not able to find a single butterfly. Today, I decided to think like a butterfly and headed to a small hill in Otay Mountain. Otay Mountain usually has early flight for many species. The temperature was at 60, with clear sky. Hills are green and flowers (Deerweed, Buckwheat, Bladderpod, Lilac, Sunflowers, etc) were blooming, but I was not able to find Sara Orangetip. However, on the hilltops, I was able to find following butterflies. Echo Azure (Celastina echo echo) x10+ already worn & torn Perplexing Hairstreak (Callophrys perplexa perplexa) x3 bit worn Southern Silvery Blue (Glaucopsyche lygdamus australis) x1 fresh Unknown Nymphalid (probably Vanessa) x1 fly by So, the spring butterflies have started their flight in San Diego Co. And their condition tells me they have been flying for few days already. Sara must be flying somewhere in SoCal !! We need little bit more of rain though$B!D(B Koji San Diego ------------------------------------ Subject: NM: The First Stirrings From: Elaine Halbedel <rabb1toid AT yahoo.com> Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2012 17:54:35 -0800 (PST) I've been out of email range for several days, but on January 6th, the first butterfly of the (i.e., 'my') season appeared in southern NM. While fossil-hunting in the southern Caballo Mts. (just north of Hatch, NM), I found a fresh MYLITTA CRESCENT sunning itself on the rocks of a stream bed. Since there was still snow on most of the north-facing slopes, he was cold and slow enough that I snagged him with my collecting bag, so could verify his diagnostic marks in hand. He looked very fresh but very lonely... Nothing is green yet here, though we have had enough precipitation that there are hopes for some sort of normal spring. Elaine Halbedel Silver City, NM [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: My AOL Account Was Hacked From: fsmodel AT aol.com Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2012 23:15:27 -0500 (EST) Hi Everyone, Most- if not all - of you received wacky e-mails earlier today, allegedly from me. They were not. Apparently my e-mail account was hacked. DO NOT open the links in those e-mails. I have taken corrective measures. Hoipefully that will be the end of it. If not, I will have to get a new e-mail address. Sorry for the trouble. Frank [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: staceysplace2005 From: fsmodel AT aol.com Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2012 18:50:27 -0500 (EST) Hi, my darling! http://sadadadoksadoksx.com/houm/btfujexdgbh.php?imoidname=3 Sun, 8 Jan 2012 0:50:26 ____________ "--But I have got something here a great deal better." (c) Talin votegetters ------------------------------------ Subject: Tucson Botanical Gardens 1/5/11 From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2012 02:07:20 +0100 I added MONARCH & QUEEN to my 2012 butterfly list today at Tucson Botanical Gardens. There is a blooming loquat tree between the Butterfly Magic greenhouse & the Education building, attracting at least several queens, monarchs & a red admiral, possibly more. Mary Klinkel Tucson, AZ p.s. way to go Ken on the leilia!! [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: re SEAZ early Asterocampa leilia From: "Ken" <teleost07 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2012 23:43:59 -0000 Why not a possible LATE record?, you might ask. Good question Hank. I would have thought that the cold early winter rains would have put an end to further emergence of the 2011 cohort, but I don't really know how that works. Ken Kertell Tucson ------------------------------------ Subject: SEAZ early Asterocampa leilia From: "Ken" <teleost07 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2012 23:22:30 -0000 Following the great early winter rains described previously by Jim Brock, it has been warming here, with today's temp again about 75 in Tucson. Still, seeing a fresh Empress leilia (Asterocampa leilia) patrolling its little territory on the Pima Canyon Trail, in Santa Catalina Mountains, was unexpected during my check today (5 Jan) for an early sara (none). According to the early/late dates for SEAZ butterlies maintained by Rich Bailowitz, the previous date range for leilia was 21 February to 19 December. Ken Kertell Tucson ------------------------------------ Subject: FW: Box Canyon today (1/3/12) SE AZ From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2012 05:35:08 +0100 forwarded from Gary Jue 1/3/12 Box Canyon SE AZ Hi Mary, There wasn't a lot of species flying in Box Canyon today, I logged only seven species, but of those that were flying most had decent numbers. Southern Dogface Zerene cesonia 2 Sleepy Orange Abaeis nicippe 10 Dainty Sulphur Nathalis iole 15+ Mexican Yellow Eurema mexicana 60+ Reakirt’s Blue Echinargus isola 1 Spring Azure Celastrina ladon 10 White Checkered-Skipper Pyrgus albescens 2 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: NE Tucson Agua Caliente Park 1/4/11 From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2012 05:32:46 +0100 Took a quick stroll through Agua Caliente Park today, looking for birds mainly, and saw one dainty sulphur & one red admiral. That brings my 2012 list up to 15 species. On Monday, 1/2/12, Fred Heath, Gary Jue, Ken Kertell & I participated in a Christmas Bird Count at Pena Blanca Lake in SE AZ. In between birds, we saw a few butterflies including pipevine swallowtail, mexican yellow, sleepy orange, dainty sulphur, reakirt's blue, western pygmy-blue and funereal duskywing. Mary Klinkel, Tucson, AZ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: SEABA field trips New Year's Eve & New Year's Day From: mary klinkel <munchita AT msn.com> Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2012 03:57:25 +0100 We just couldn't pass up the opportunity to see butterflies on 12/31/11 and 1/1/12. With temps in the 70's for several days (and a record-setting 80 degrees today) we were keeping our fingers crossed for newly-emerged butterflies. Alas, no orangetips yet, and we did look for sisters also, Brian, but didn't see any (yet). We did place bets on what would be our first butterfly of 2012, and Spring Azure was it! Full lists follow. Happy New Year! Mary Klinkel, Tucson, AZ Sabino Canyon NE Tucson AZ 12/31/11 Southern Dogface Zerene cesonia Mexican Yellow Eurema mexicana Sleepy Orange Abais nicippe Dainty Sulphur Nathalis iole Spring Azure Celestrina ladon American Snout Libytheana carinenta Queen Danaus gilippis Monarch Danaus plexippus Red Admiral Vanessa atalanta Molino Canyon NE Tucson AZ 1/1/12 Pipevine Swallowtail Battus philenor (fresh!) Southern Dogface Zerene cesonia Mexican Yellow Eurema mexicana Sleepy Orange Abais nicippe Dainty Sulphur Nathalis iole Spring Azure Celastrina ladon American Snout Libytheana carinenta ...And around my yard & neighborhood NE Tucson AZ 1/1/12 Gray Hairstreak Strymon melinus Marine Blue Leptotes marina Ceraunus Blue Hemiargus ceraunus Reakirt's Blue Echinargus isola [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: In the Spirit of Season Summaries and Goodwill Toward Man From: "Mark Walker" <xvermontrz AT att.net> Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2012 12:11:03 -0800 So, as it is January 1st - and the beginning of a new year - I suppose I should really try and be more diligent about recording what I see (or capture)(or dispatch). In years past, this would have been an even more worthwhile and interesting endeavor. These days I get out so much more rarely - and that's a complete travesty - but the point here is that I, in the spirit of everything that Season Summaries (and their dedicated and selfless volunteer coordinators) stand for, am going to try to change my behavior for 2012. Some day (God willing) I will indeed compile a careful list of every vouchered specimen within my possession, and I pray that I will do so this very year - because it is the recorded voucher that matters most to me, and I suspect to anyone. Yes, it is true that the well cared for and carefully mounted and displayed specimen possesses great value worthy of admiration solely on its own and independent of its collection data. It's also a true that a thorough and philatelic collection of judiciously displayed species representatives is a cherished possession. But to me, the only best reason to grab (possess, behold, and admire) anything from nature is to produce (and preserve) a record of the event of its existence. As a result, I should be more adamant about recounting and propagating such records. Admittedly, my vouchers represent substantially more than public records. In my case, virtually each one represents a snapshot of some specific adventure or memorable experience. Together they form a lattice over which my life is encoded - drawers full of specimens carefully linking me with the events that have shaped and defined me - a recounting of the random walk that has been my life. This is a very personal worth - not something that will likely be shared or well appreciated by others. It should not be a great shock to me if the great value of my life's passion (and obsession) is not fully or appropriately recognized by others. I should not be crushed if it appears as if no one but me recognizes their true value. I should be excited and encouraged that any value at all would be assessed or recognized by others for my specimen's (or the data they may represent) - and the selfless volunteers who keep, manage, compile, and propagate the importance of our records should be thanked, appreciated, and encouraged. In any case, we should be diligent to share any data of importance with posterity before it is lost to the dust that is our destiny. I suppose there are other appropriate reasons to harvest insects - including for sustenance (Chris Durden testifies that many parts are edible!) - but to hoard the records without sharing and then erase them intentionally is unthinkable to me. I wonder what 2012 will hold? I'm glad I don't know ahead of time. May it hold untold butterfly (and moth) adventures for everyone who may be listening. Happy New Year. Mark From: SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Sent: Sunday, January 01, 2012 9:09 AM To: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com Subject: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary butterfly records sent off Everyone: I just sent off the butterfly section of the records for the 2011 Season Summary to Leroy Koehn. Kelly Richers is still compiling the Zone 3 moth section. It is great Kelly can do that because I am not competent at all in moths or caterpillars as you all probably already knew. So give Kelly Richers credit for all the work he does. Its all about providing the best reports possible to help amateurs and professions alike, yes, even the elite whomever they may be. Also, thanks for all of you that contributed records. For those that have said "I am not sending you any of my records Ken" that is your right. But when these are published in April (we hope) they cease to be "Ken's records" and they become public records available to scientists and all of you. I am certainly NOT going to get credit for YOUR records. I only hope to get credit for compiling a good report. The absolute last day to get records to me was yesterday. Kelly may or may not accept records for moths that reach us now. You can still submit butterfly records to me for 2011, but they would likely go in the 2012 Season Summary. A few 2010 records I misplaced in last years summary will go in this years report. While my deadline is late January to get the Season Summary spreadsheet to the Big Boss (Leroy Koehn), I get it in early by not being a procrastinator. All butterfly records received by my deadline worthy of being included in the report are in. I started putting together the spreadsheet on December 18th and inserted "rows" and records received since then. While I did procrastinate getting records together in the early part of the year because of last years publishing delays, I did get it together with a veangence in the second half of the year. I now have to review about ten thousand BAMONA database records to find about a hundred problematic errors. New contributors codes will go in for Pete Spino, David Horner, Gary Jue, Carl Lindblad, Marcelline VandeWater, Jim Dreier and Ray Bruun. A few others with records being published will be included with their full names under the comments. Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" C 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: 2011 Season Summary butterfly records sent off From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2012 09:08:52 -0800 Everyone: I just sent off the butterfly section of the records for the 2011 Season Summary to Leroy Koehn. Kelly Richers is still compiling the Zone 3 moth section. It is great Kelly can do that because I am not competent at all in moths or caterpillars as you all probably already knew. So give Kelly Richers credit for all the work he does. Its all about providing the best reports possible to help amateurs and professions alike, yes, even the elite whomever they may be. Also, thanks for all of you that contributed records. For those that have said "I am not sending you any of my records Ken" that is your right. But when these are published in April (we hope) they cease to be "Ken's records" and they become public records available to scientists and all of you. I am certainly NOT going to get credit for YOUR records. I only hope to get credit for compiling a good report. The absolute last day to get records to me was yesterday. Kelly may or may not accept records for moths that reach us now. You can still submit butterfly records to me for 2011, but they would likely go in the 2012 Season Summary. A few 2010 records I misplaced in last years summary will go in this years report. While my deadline is late January to get the Season Summary spreadsheet to the Big Boss (Leroy Koehn), I get it in early by not being a procrastinator. All butterfly records received by my deadline worthy of being included in the report are in. I started putting together the spreadsheet on December 18th and inserted "rows" and records received since then. While I did procrastinate getting records together in the early part of the year because of last years publishing delays, I did get it together with a veangence in the second half of the year. I now have to review about ten thousand BAMONA database records to find about a hundred problematic errors. New contributors codes will go in for Pete Spino, David Horner, Gary Jue, Carl Lindblad, Marcelline VandeWater, Jim Dreier and Ray Bruun. A few others with records being published will be included with their full names under the comments. Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Monarchs Overwintering in the Desert From: Paul Cherubini <monarch AT saber.net> Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2011 16:39:41 -0800 Gail Morris of Chandler, AZ (suburb of Phoenix) captured this video of monarchs nectaring and overwintering near downtown Phoenix on Dec. 29: http://tinyurl.com/86xow2g (You will probably need to be registered and logged in at Facebook in order to view the video). You can tell most of these desert monarchs, just like most of the winter monarchs along the California coast are mostly in reproductive diapause because they are nectaring gregariously. Reproductive monarchs are so sex crazed they will chase and pounce on one other. Anyway, Gail's observations further confirm what Ken Davenport, Derham Guiliani, Mark Walker and Alex Grkovich have been reporting for decades: that some migratory monarchs pass the winter in low desert areas of California and Arizona. Paul Cherubini El Dorado, Calif. ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: Re: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good From: Pete Spino <petespino8 AT yahoo.com> Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2011 16:02:20 -0800 (PST) Hi Koji and Mark, I saw a couple phyleus next to the Doubletree Resort on Carmel Mountain Road last week. Would love to walk Blue Sky Preserve in Poway soon. That riparian habitat rebounded quite well from the fires. Used to go there a lot when I lived in Poway and I always would see my FOS Sara there. Pete ________________________________ From: Kojiro Shiraiwa To: SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com Sent: Friday, December 30, 2011 8:33 AM Subject: [SoWestLep] Re: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good   Cool, I should go out too. Maybe I can find Sara in Penasquitos Canyon… About a week ago, my wife said she found a small worn-out brown skipper basking in our backyard. I presume it was the Fiery Skipper (Hylephila phyleus)! Koji On 2011/12/30, at 8:09, Mark Walker wrote: > Thanks Pete. It’s just been glorious the past few days here in Oceanside. Yesterday we had a female Phoebis sennae ovipositing on the foodplant in our backyard. There were also fresh Agraulis vanillae flying about our passion vine. One of us needs to hike into one of our local riparian habitats just to see what else has decided to start 2012 a tad bit early. > > Mark.. > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Crazy, tiny Buckeye... From: Liam OBrien <liammail56 AT yahoo.com> Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2011 09:05:34 -0800 (PST) Hey folks -- My First Posting...guess we don't really have a "NoWestLep" group, do we? anyway...I've enjoyed reading all of these postings since I joined a few months back. Kicked up a fresh, tiny (size of a female campestris) J. coenia the other day (Dec. 26th) out along the Sawyer Camp Trail in San Mateo Co., CA I know multiple broods of this species overlap, so perhaps that was all I observed, but I thought it was noteworthy. Doesn't this species overwinter in the larval stage? Then I read Art Shapiro's guide and it said this tiny adult form is the one that overwinters? Or was it a harbinger of an early-emergence-due-to-unseasonably-warm-weather-faux-spring? Love that there is still stuff to learn.... Happy New Year to all...   Liam O'Brien 4114 -17th Street San Francisco, CA 94114 http://www.sfbutterfly.com   Liam O'Brien 4114 -17th Street San Francisco, CA 94114 http://www.sfbutterfly.com "Only if we understand can we care.  Only if we care will we help.  Only if we help shall they be saved."  - Jane Goodall [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good From: Kojiro Shiraiwa <whiterock AT bekkoame.ne.jp> Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2011 08:33:22 -0800 Cool, I should go out too. Maybe I can find Sara in Penasquitos Canyon$B!D(B About a week ago, my wife said she found a small worn-out brown skipper basking in our backyard. I presume it was the Fiery Skipper (Hylephila phyleus)! Koji On 2011/12/30, at 8:09, Mark Walker wrote: > Thanks Pete. It$B!G(Bs just been glorious the past few days here in Oceanside. Yesterday we had a female Phoebis sennae ovipositing on the foodplant in our backyard. There were also fresh Agraulis vanillae flying about our passion vine. One of us needs to hike into one of our local riparian habitats just to see what else has decided to start 2012 a tad bit early. > > Mark.. > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: RE: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good From: "Mark Walker" <xvermontrz AT att.net> Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2011 08:09:11 -0800 Thanks Pete. It’s just been glorious the past few days here in Oceanside. Yesterday we had a female Phoebis sennae ovipositing on the foodplant in our backyard. There were also fresh Agraulis vanillae flying about our passion vine. One of us needs to hike into one of our local riparian habitats just to see what else has decided to start 2012 a tad bit early. Mark. From: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com [mailto:DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Pete Spino Sent: Thursday, December 29, 2011 6:51 PM To: SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com Subject: [DesertLeps] Carlsbad was pretty good I took the family to Legoland park today. Legoland, as most of you know, is located in Carlsbad near the coast in N. San Diego County. It was warm and sunny and 70 -- as it has been here all week. Inland valley temps have been even higher. We saw five Cloudless Sulphurs. Three Monarchs. One Cabbage White. And a Mourning Cloak in a pear tree. Actually, the Nymphalis was on a fake Christmas Tree made entirely with Legos. Pete ________________________________ From: "JimJoanJoy AT aol.com " > To: xvermontrz AT att.net ; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com ; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com ; tils-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, December 27, 2011 7:14 AM Subject: [SoWestLep] Re: [DesertLeps] Oceanside Christmas Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. Mark, More than "some" precipitation has fallen here. I've had 4 inches of rain in my yard since November 1! I've noticed the north sides of our local hillsides have green carpets of sprouting annuals on them. Yesterday I noticed Decurainia pinnata coming up in my yard. It should be a great spring down here especially for the annual feeding pierids such as cethura, lotta and sisymbrii. Sara will also be great and I suspect protodice will reappear after a horrible, almost nonexisitent flight in 2011. With the current warming trend and change in weather pattern we might see Sara Orangetips as early as late January in the lower Santa Catalina foothills. Yes, bring on 2012. Jim B In a message dated 12/26/2011 9:31:57 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, xvermontrz AT att.net writes: Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Carlsbad was pretty good From: Pete Spino <petespino8 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2011 18:51:21 -0800 (PST) I took the family to Legoland park today. Legoland, as most of you know, is located in Carlsbad near the coast in N. San Diego County. It was warm and sunny and 70 -- as it has been here all week. Inland valley temps have been even higher. We saw five Cloudless Sulphurs. Three Monarchs. One Cabbage White. And a Mourning Cloak in a pear tree. Actually, the Nymphalis was on a fake Christmas Tree made entirely with Legos. Pete ________________________________ From: "JimJoanJoy AT aol.com" To: xvermontrz AT att.net; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; tils-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, December 27, 2011 7:14 AM Subject: [SoWestLep] Re: [DesertLeps] Oceanside Christmas   Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. Mark, More than "some" precipitation has fallen here. I've had 4 inches of rain in my yard since November 1! I've noticed the north sides of our local hillsides have green carpets of sprouting annuals on them. Yesterday I noticed Decurainia pinnata coming up in my yard. It should be a great spring down here especially for the annual feeding pierids such as cethura, lotta and sisymbrii. Sara will also be great and I suspect protodice will reappear after a horrible, almost nonexisitent flight in 2011. With the current warming trend and change in weather pattern we might see Sara Orangetips as early as late January in the lower Santa Catalina foothills. Yes, bring on 2012. Jim B In a message dated 12/26/2011 9:31:57 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, xvermontrz AT att.net writes: Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: (unknown) From: Bruce Walsh <jbwalsh AT u.arizona.edu> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 21:19:56 -0700 for a good laugh, check out # 4 on http://vitals.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/12/27/9746096-doh-top-science-journal-retractions-of-2011# #4: Butterfly meets worm, falls in love, and has caterpillars. The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) published a fantastic claim in 2009 by zoologist Donald Williamson, which was delightfully reported in the science news media. Williamson claimed that ancestors of modern butterflies mistakenly fertilized their eggs with sperm from velvet worms. The result was the necessity for the caterpillar stage of the butterfly life cycle. The PNAS paper got a few laughs among evolutionary scientists, but it hasn't yet been retracted. Williamson's follow-up 2011 paper in the journal Symbiosis, however, has been retracted. Researchers Michael Hart and Richard Grosberg at the University of Texas, Austin, systematically refuted all of Williamson's claims in the pages of PNAS by the end of 2009. They based their arguments entirely on well-known concepts of both basic evolution and the genetics of modern worms and butterflies. When Symbiosis published its butterfly-meets-worm article in January 2011, Hart raised questions with the editor. As of November the paper is no longer available. --> link to original PNAS paper http://www.pnas.org/content/106/47/19901.full ------------------------------------ Subject: RE: [DesertLeps] Oceanside Christmas From: "Mark Walker" <xvermontrz AT att.net> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 13:33:54 -0800 Thanks for the ever improving forecast from SEAZ, Jim. I'm looking forward to paying a visit in late February or early March. Please someone tell Doug Mullins to prepare the Volvo for adventure! Mark. From: JimJoanJoy AT aol.com [mailto:JimJoanJoy AT aol.com] Sent: Tuesday, December 27, 2011 7:14 AM To: xvermontrz AT att.net; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; tils-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Oceanside Christmas Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. Mark, More than "some" precipitation has fallen here. I've had 4 inches of rain in my yard since November 1! I've noticed the north sides of our local hillsides have green carpets of sprouting annuals on them. Yesterday I noticed Decurainia pinnata coming up in my yard. It should be a great spring down here especially for the annual feeding pierids such as cethura, lotta and sisymbrii. Sara will also be great and I suspect protodice will reappear after a horrible, almost nonexisitent flight in 2011. With the current warming trend and change in weather pattern we might see Sara Orangetips as early as late January in the lower Santa Catalina foothills. Yes, bring on 2012. Jim B In a message dated 12/26/2011 9:31:57 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, xvermontrz AT att.net writes: Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: South Florida December 1-15 2011 From: fsmodel AT aol.com Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 15:06:22 -0500 (EST) Happy Holidays! Here is the much-ballyhooed set of butterflies [one moth] from South Florida.: _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157628592529363/_ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157628592529363/) I saw a lot of courting / mating / oviposition on this trip and these photos reflect that. Probably most noteworthy [though posted previously] is the mated pair of pink-spot sulphur [Aphrissa neleis], newly discovered on the mainland, from Miami Beach Botanical Garden. But there is also a nice sequence of an ovipositing great southern white from Key West Botanical Garden, a courting pair of Cassius blue from the Everglades City area, a gorgeous 'sawing' martial scrub hairstreak from Bahia State Park, and some very fresh ruddy daggerwings from Castellow Hammock, among many others. Everything is ordered alphabetically by common name. Happy surfing. The next butterfly pictures you'll see from me will be from southern California. Cheers, Frank [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: [DesertLeps] Oceanside Christmas From: JimJoanJoy AT aol.com Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 10:14:21 -0500 (EST) Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. Mark, More than "some" precipitation has fallen here. I've had 4 inches of rain in my yard since November 1! I've noticed the north sides of our local hillsides have green carpets of sprouting annuals on them. Yesterday I noticed Decurainia pinnata coming up in my yard. It should be a great spring down here especially for the annual feeding pierids such as cethura, lotta and sisymbrii. Sara will also be great and I suspect protodice will reappear after a horrible, almost nonexisitent flight in 2011. With the current warming trend and change in weather pattern we might see Sara Orangetips as early as late January in the lower Santa Catalina foothills. Yes, bring on 2012. Jim B In a message dated 12/26/2011 9:31:57 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, xvermontrz AT att.net writes: Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Re: [leps-talk] Oceanside Christmas From: Alex Grkovich <agrkovich2003 AT yahoo.com> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 03:34:20 -0800 (PST) Mark,   I myself have taken P. sennae in La Jolla in early February (while on a visit to our older son)...So yes, it is a year round species down there...   However, it does not occur year round here in Beautiful Peabody, MA...   Alex ________________________________ From: Mark Walker To: SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; 'TILS' Sent: Monday, December 26, 2011 11:31 PM Subject: [leps-talk] Oceanside Christmas   After spending a white December 25 with my children skiing in the San Bernardino National Forest, we emerged in Oceanside on Monday to an extremely pleasant day. By noon the temperature was above 70 and I had already seen three butterflies -including a freshly emerged and courting pair of Phoebis sennae (the third a small and frantic Celastrina). The sulphurs were the first I've seen in many weeks - but that includes two spent at Lakehurst, N.J. where no butterflies were seen (though the daytime temperatures were consistently higher than those back home in California during the same period). Anyway, it was nice to ponder the fact that Phoebis sennae clearly lives year round here in Oceanside, California. It was also nice to poke about outside in warmth the day after Christmas. Our coastal hillsides are greening up after a cool and reasonably wet late autumn. Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. Mark. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Oceanside Christmas From: "Mark Walker" <xvermontrz AT att.net> Date: Mon, 26 Dec 2011 20:31:52 -0800 After spending a white December 25 with my children skiing in the San Bernardino National Forest, we emerged in Oceanside on Monday to an extremely pleasant day. By noon the temperature was above 70 and I had already seen three butterflies -including a freshly emerged and courting pair of Phoebis sennae (the third a small and frantic Celastrina). The sulphurs were the first I've seen in many weeks - but that includes two spent at Lakehurst, N.J. where no butterflies were seen (though the daytime temperatures were consistently higher than those back home in California during the same period). Anyway, it was nice to ponder the fact that Phoebis sennae clearly lives year round here in Oceanside, California. It was also nice to poke about outside in warmth the day after Christmas. Our coastal hillsides are greening up after a cool and reasonably wet late autumn. Glad to hear some of the precipitation has made its way to Arizona. Bring on 2012. Mark. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: Fw: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Fri, 23 Dec 2011 09:10:58 -0800 Alex: I understand how you feel about the below issues (lumping your name in the comments) under another persons code. I have to do the same thing when multiple people in a group (like on a butterfly count or NABA group outing or an unusual trio who rarely work together do). Again, its a matter of running out of code letters and giving credit to the main one associated with the discovery (if stated or known) or by the first person (or sometimes the most credible person) to submit the record. Again, the persons listed under comments may have their names code or full name in the report. That in turn can hamper providing information in the Summary that explains the significance of the record. I recently submitted a report to the Season Summary by John Emmel and three other famous people and came up with a code for all four. When the codes and contributors section was published, it had been changed by the coordinator To John F. Emmel et al because all the names would not fit in the format for the summary. In this years summary for your two records, I gave you credit and listed MW for Mark Walker and Koji Shiraiwa by name (since I do not yet have any other records from him in the 2011 Summary). One record just lists you as the observor (the others were not mentioned in your report and the butterfly being reported was well known in that region) I have had those who were in a really big group insist everyones name be included. That is not going to happen. Scientists want to know the primary source/s of a record to contact and there has to be a workable means to convey information in a report in the required format. Otherwise, I would have to reject such records...or I could do what Langston did...."Xerces Society field trip" or NABA or SEABA group or butterfly count group which to be honest would probably hurt the chance of such a record being accepted more than help it. Groups are not credible in themselves, its more about who are most credible witnesses, collectors, photographers and made the ID. In any case, it is unworkable to publish the same record multiple times to give individual credit to several different individuals who saw the same thing at the same place on the same day (if you saw dinosaurs I may make an exception). We do make codes for "teams of individuals" who regularly contribute or send in LOTS of good records. And in the case of well known common species from localities well known already, why not just use the name of only the person submitting the record? If I am with a guy who catches a rare butterfly, I am OK with my name not being included in the published record. The one who caught it goes on the "collected by" label. The names of others being included in a report is really only important in my view to substantiate a questionable, highly significant or possibly controversial record In one case last summer, I was with Paul Levine and a few other individuals when Paul Levine spotted an Indra Swallowtail and he alerted the group and I to its presence. I eventually caught the thing. In that case, I mentioned Paul Levine by name in the comments in the Season Summary Report. So I am not making rules here...it will be up to individual Coordinators to decide what works best for them. Every case may be a bit different. It is these kinds of issues which make Season Summaries so difficult to compile and produce. Ken Davenport Actually, I do appreciate you, Ken, and for example Mark Mello, for printing the majority (or all) of my own reports...I AM actually somewhat indignant at others who have not published, or have lumped my own observations and submittals under another person's name or title...This DOES defnitely discourage me from taking the time to compile and send in reports... Last year, for example, I sent in a record of Anartia fatima to the TX coordinator, and my record got cannabalized and was listed under someone else's name. I must say that that did offend me...and like Harry, I would like to see more records from the East...But then maybe folks from the Eastern States are not sending in reports...(?) Anyway, Merry Christmas... Alex From: Harry Pavulaan To: Ken Davenport (NEW) ; Leps-talk Leps-talk Sent: Thursday, December 22, 2011 9:07 PM Subject: RE: [leps-talk] Fw: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress All: I prefer to have the Season Summary include interesting and unusual records as well as county records. Irruptions, new hosts, odd flight periods, etc. are all as equally interesting as county records to some. The Lep. Soc. leadership needs to "think out of the box" on this. Use NABA as an example. Perhaps go the way of the 4th of July Count Summaries - charge an extra fee for just the S.S. I would be willing to pay the extra amount. Also, if NABA can post hundreds of sightings daily in the Sightings pages, I don't see why the Lep. Soc. cannot move the S.S. reporting online. Doesn't have to be daily, but perhaps at seasonal intervals. Or simply post the current year's S.S. online for a year, then move all records to the database, then replace the S.S. with next year's S.S. One of my biggest complaints with the Season Summary since joining the Lep. Soc. in 1982 is the wasting of my time compiling lengthy reports, even with new county records, then having those reports ignored by the zone coordinator! Seems more prevalent in the east. For exactly this reason, I no longer send reports. Perhaps if reporting went online, the zone coordinators might be more willing to accept all those reports. Just some wild, wacky thoughts! Harry > To: TILS-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com > From: kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2011 07:56:20 -0800 > Subject: [leps-talk] Fw: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress > > Paul: > > Your comments below can be a concern and many folks in high places in the Lepidopterists' Society who read this interchange of communication can see what your concerns are and my response to your concerns. > > The reason why the policy was initiated perhaps ten years ago by the Chief Coordinator) is because there are limited letter and number combinations and we are limited to only three of those in a code. Code possibilities are limited; each year we have a long list of contributors codes to go through. Problems are obvious because available combinations with popular letters are now quite limited in some letter groups.. We don't want to run out of code combination possibilities that could destroy our system by needlessly using those by one time or rare contributors, as had been done in the past. Those that demonstrate they will be regular contributors (many are one time contributers) will have codes made. Even those that have that important record we want to publish who have no code are mentioned and in many respects in a better way than those with codes. Their names are listed in entirety in the comments section. Individuals with codes are named once in an introductory box by zone or region. Often such records from someone without a code were not reported by the person who had the record but by someone else. For example Fred Heath often reports such records by individuals who have never reported records to the Season Summary and they are often NOT even Lepidopterists' Society members (NOT a requirement to get your record published, my concern is advancing science, not politics or memberships. When it becomes apparent to me that some of these individuals are active in the field, become or are knowledgeable about what they are seeing (credibility) and begin contacting me with additional records or clarifications, then I give them their own code. In other cases where I learn of a significant record from someone not with a code themselves, I may use my own code letters and explain in the comments section who the observor, photographer or collector was. The Season Summary is published once a year and all members get a copy of that report once a year, included as a benefit of their $45 per year membership. > > While I understand why some may be upset with this, I can see clearly why we had to do this. It is also obvious to me that the Lepidopterist's Society annual Season Summary is the BEST way to get your personal records that are important out there and available to scientists and folks that may have an interest in your discoveries. Part of that is because the system is refereed and credibility of records is a factor in their acceptance. Compare that with butterfly counts reports which may have a long list of participants but no specific localities or names of the specific observers who actually saw species of interests. The BAMONA records database (also refereed) is also problematic because that organization has chosen to keep the names of contributors confidential. I as a coordinator get "made up" names of the contributors (just a code name actually) and localities where butterflies of interest were found are similarly kept secret. (Although I found localities in my own file this past week so maybe that policy has changed). So like the NABA database, a BAMONA contributor can see their own records, but a scientist or interested person can not, unless they contact a person at the top. Such confidentiality of contributors names means such records are not really very usable by scientists...its like a hit record with no name of the recording artists. And records with only county and state information are similarly unacceptable for serious use. Another former practice in scientific journals I have seen is the use of only months and year notations without a specific dates. Which often kills the usability of such records. But as I mentioned already, those in the Season Summary Reports even without codes are mentioned by name (printed out instead of code) and those records are just as usable as those who have a code. > > Thanks Fred for reporting such records of interest to me and I should note I have created codes for many new folks in Arizona in recent years. Membership in the Lepidopterists' Society is NOT a requirement to have your own code. It is irrelevant. What is important to me is that you are contributing multiple records that are credible and worthwhile to our report (new COUNTY or STATE RECORDS, range extensions, new host plant records, new localities for rare butterflies or butterflies of limited range, rare strays or document species poorly known in our National Parks (this year I got some good ones from the Grand Canyon...in those cases those are usually photographs since few can get Collecting Permits, but I will accept observations from very credible sources for many species). Kelly Richers does moths for me for the Southwest and because there are so many more moths than butterfly species, it just about has to be a new COUNTY record at least for him to publish it. I rarely collect moths at all, but I do probably have one of the better personal Annaphila collections, thanks to a great 1987 article with color plates by Ron Leuschener back in 1997. Unfortunately, Annaphila moth populations are slow to bounce back following forest fires and I rarely see them anymore. But I digress. > > I hope this information helps everyone to understand. Those of you who are not members of the Lepidopterists' Society, please ask a member to show you a recent copy of the annual Season Summary. They are high quality and book sized. And they are easily readable, something not always true in the past. The format we use now is much more clear and workable. > > Ken Davenport > > > > Hi Ken, > > > I'd like to comment on the policy of conserving contributor codes. I know it's not your policy, you're just following directions. But I recommend fighting it as much as possible. The Lep Soc is concerned about dwindling membership, so wants to be inclusive. And in general I am impressed with how welcoming the Lep Soc is to amateurs and newcomers. However, the policy of listing records under the name of more seasoned lepsters seems completely contrary to that. I wonder how many first-time submitters are discouraged from making any further submissions due to what must seem like a "Good Old Boys" mentality. I would gladly be PGJ37 if it meant that more people could feel welcomed into the Lep Soc. > > > Please share this message as appropriate. > > > Thanks, > > > Paul > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------- > From: "kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com" > To: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com > Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2011 10:27 AM > Subject: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress > > > > Everyone: > > I am currently hard at work in compiling the report for the 2011 Season Summary with Arizona being worked on first. Thanks for helping me get that locality name problem worked out for Grand Canyon National Park and what a name it was! I am currently working up new codes for some new contributors that in the past have been given credit through others reporting or sponsoring records to conserve available code letters and numbers. Those getting codes this year include at least Gary Jue, Carl Lundblad and Marcelline VandeWater. > > It was a great year for Ascia monuste in Arizona and I plan to publish many of those records which are supported by actual specimens or photos. > > I have little more time to work on the Season Summary today. I expect to finish Arizona tomorrow and likely with get into the California Report (I got your report Alex G.) tomorrow. I also have a lot of BAMONA records to fix so it is an extremely busy time of the year for me. > > Nice comments from many of you on potential areas of overlap on Juniper Hairstreaks (Callophrys (Mitoura) gryneus-siva). It appears there is much more area of contact (eastern NM, W Texas, Nebraska) to study (has anyone done rearing studies on these? Are there larval differences?). I suspect it will be some time before we are confident how all of these really are related. Based on some results I have seen, DNA results were surprising and unexpected. And we need to do work on larger sampling numbers because some results seem contradictory based on results and conclusions by different researchers. > > Aren't we glad we have such issues to confound us during the winter season? > > Best Wishes, Ken Davenport > kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > ------------------------------------ > > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" � 1999 > > Subscribe: TILS-leps-talk-subscribe AT yahoogroups.com > Post message: TILS-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com > Unsubscribe: TILS-leps-talk-unsubscribe AT yahoogroups.com > For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org > > > Subject: NE USA & Canada 2003-2011 Butterflies and Moths Photo Collection From: fsmodel AT aol.com Date: Fri, 23 Dec 2011 09:47:04 -0500 (EST) Hi Everyone, If anyone is interested, there have been some minor additions / deletions to my above-captioned photo collection which now holds 1339 photos, sorted alphabetically by common name. [There remain some unidentified moths and caterpillars under "moth sp" and "caterpillar sp".] _http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157627816645921/_ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/fsmodel/sets/72157627816645921/) This closes the books on 2011. On to 2012. C'mon spring.... Cheers, Frank [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: Fw: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2011 23:23:33 -0800 Harry: (Much of this is directed to the readers, not to you personally Harry). I can't really say why you have had such problems publishing records in your zone. I submitted records for your zone in 2008 and 2010 from Arkansas. What I saw in that report was few look for or contribute records in that state or maybe state coordinators in the East are not pro-active in seeking records for the Season Summary. County lists (per BAMONA) there were obviously very imcomplete. When I sent in my records I noted their status as NEW COUNTY Records or other reasons why such records were important. Many of those records were published for the reasons I gave. I don't know if you noted your own County records or not in your Reports. It is a good idea to do so, NEVER assume your Regional Coordinator knows what is new for your area or not. While I understand contributors do not have my county lists sheets (which are often more complete than BAMONAS (which are way behind reality (Lep Soc lists) in many states), they can check the BAMONA website on-line for their list. Then alert the Coordinator you believe you may have a COUNTY record. Coordinators are not going to check out every single species listed on a long list in this way Very few butterfly records from Zone 3 (the Southwest) are County records. Most are of the nature you mention that should be published. County records do dominate the moth records for Zone 3 and if you look at the regions moth records done by Kelly Richers you will see why. His list of records is longer than mine by far. As far as regular sighting pages, that might have to be done using a self-imput computerized system similar to what NABA and BAMONA have and in that, the records would probably be based on what people think they saw, not what they really saw. A year-around Season Summary would kill my personal collecting, researching and writing and it would not fit in with my already heavy work and family responsibilities. Really, Leps Serves already serve the purpose you mention and I do screen records that way already. As far as lengthy reports, most of those for Zone 3 are moths. If folks limit their reports to those types of records I have previously mentioned, most submitted lists will be short. Very few folks submit as many as ten usable records for butterflies. I am not setting limits here, some really productive lepidopterists in some less known areas may have many more. I recommend keeping a list of such records in your computer files with pertinent information and then send them to your Coordinator (listed in the NEWS of the Lepidopterists' Society) after the Season ends or before December. Do not feel you have to put your list in a spreadsheet. Spreadsheets are a colossal pain to download or read. I print out submitted information and then take pertinent records and put them in my spreadsheet. Some Coordinators delegate state reports to others. That seems to work well for Oklahoma. It may not work in other states as well. I do not do that in the Southwest. But if I had George Austin alive and working again, it would make sense to give him the Coordinator job for Nevada. I get very few publishable records for Nevada. I am aware many BAMONA Coordinators are not keeping up with their work load. I am sure that all of us can improve or do better. If some Coordinators for the Season Season are just are putting out little effort or regard the Summary as an unnecessary chore, then it might be better to find replacements. But then, there are usually few people who KNOW their region well enough to assess records for the Season Summary Report. But then KNOWING does no good if that person is NOT DOING their job. Robert Langston and Ray Stanford did their jobs well. Ken Davenport All: I prefer to have the Season Summary include interesting and unusual records as well as county records. Irruptions, new hosts, odd flight periods, etc. are all as equally interesting as county records to some. The Lep. Soc. leadership needs to "think out of the box" on this. Use NABA as an example. Perhaps go the way of the 4th of July Count Summaries - charge an extra fee for just the S.S. I would be willing to pay the extra amount. Also, if NABA can post hundreds of sightings daily in the Sightings pages, I don't see why the Lep. Soc. cannot move the S.S. reporting online. Doesn't have to be daily, but perhaps at seasonal intervals. Or simply post the current year's S.S. online for a year, then move all records to the database, then replace the S.S. with next year's S.S. One of my biggest complaints with the Season Summary since joining the Lep. Soc. in 1982 is the wasting of my time compiling lengthy reports, even with new county records, then having those reports ignored by the zone coordinator! Seems more prevalent in the east. For exactly this reason, I no longer send reports. Perhaps if reporting went online, the zone coordinators might be more willing to accept all those reports. Just some wild, wacky thoughts! Harry > To: TILS-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com > From: kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2011 07:56:20 -0800 > Subject: [leps-talk] Fw: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress > > Paul: > > Your comments below can be a concern and many folks in high places in the Lepidopterists' Society who read this interchange of communication can see what your concerns are and my response to your concerns. > > The reason why the policy was initiated perhaps ten years ago by the Chief Coordinator) is because there are limited letter and number combinations and we are limited to only three of those in a code. Code possibilities are limited; each year we have a long list of contributors codes to go through. Problems are obvious because available combinations with popular letters are now quite limited in some letter groups.. We don't want to run out of code combination possibilities that could destroy our system by needlessly using those by one time or rare contributors, as had been done in the past. Those that demonstrate they will be regular contributors (many are one time contributers) will have codes made. Even those that have that important record we want to publish who have no code are mentioned and in many respects in a better way than those with codes. Their names are listed in entirety in the comments section. Individuals with codes are named once in an introductory box by zone or region. Often such records from someone without a code were not reported by the person who had the record but by someone else. For example Fred Heath often reports such records by individuals who have never reported records to the Season Summary and they are often NOT even Lepidopterists' Society members (NOT a requirement to get your record published, my concern is advancing science, not politics or memberships. When it becomes apparent to me that some of these individuals are active in the field, become or are knowledgeable about what they are seeing (credibility) and begin contacting me with additional records or clarifications, then I give them their own code. In other cases where I learn of a significant record from someone not with a code themselves, I may use my own code letters and explain in the comments section who the observor, photographer or collector was. The Season Summary is published once a year and all members get a copy of that report once a year, included as a benefit of their $45 per year membership. > > While I understand why some may be upset with this, I can see clearly why we had to do this. It is also obvious to me that the Lepidopterist's Society annual Season Summary is the BEST way to get your personal records that are important out there and available to scientists and folks that may have an interest in your discoveries. Part of that is because the system is refereed and credibility of records is a factor in their acceptance. Compare that with butterfly counts reports which may have a long list of participants but no specific localities or names of the specific observers who actually saw species of interests. The BAMONA records database (also refereed) is also problematic because that organization has chosen to keep the names of contributors confidential. I as a coordinator get "made up" names of the contributors (just a code name actually) and localities where butterflies of interest were found are similarly kept secret. (Although I found localities in my own file this past week so maybe that policy has changed). So like the NABA database, a BAMONA contributor can see their own records, but a scientist or interested person can not, unless they contact a person at the top. Such confidentiality of contributors names means such records are not really very usable by scientists...its like a hit record with no name of the recording artists. And records with only county and state information are similarly unacceptable for serious use. Another former practice in scientific journals I have seen is the use of only months and year notations without a specific dates. Which often kills the usability of such records. But as I mentioned already, those in the Season Summary Reports even without codes are mentioned by name (printed out instead of code) and those records are just as usable as those who have a code. > > Thanks Fred for reporting such records of interest to me and I should note I have created codes for many new folks in Arizona in recent years. Membership in the Lepidopterists' Society is NOT a requirement to have your own code. It is irrelevant. What is important to me is that you are contributing multiple records that are credible and worthwhile to our report (new COUNTY or STATE RECORDS, range extensions, new host plant records, new localities for rare butterflies or butterflies of limited range, rare strays or document species poorly known in our National Parks (this year I got some good ones from the Grand Canyon...in those cases those are usually photographs since few can get Collecting Permits, but I will accept observations from very credible sources for many species). Kelly Richers does moths for me for the Southwest and because there are so many more moths than butterfly species, it just about has to be a new COUNTY record at least for him to publish it. I rarely collect moths at all, but I do probably have one of the better personal Annaphila collections, thanks to a great 1987 article with color plates by Ron Leuschener back in 1997. Unfortunately, Annaphila moth populations are slow to bounce back following forest fires and I rarely see them anymore. But I digress. > > I hope this information helps everyone to understand. Those of you who are not members of the Lepidopterists' Society, please ask a member to show you a recent copy of the annual Season Summary. They are high quality and book sized. And they are easily readable, something not always true in the past. The format we use now is much more clear and workable. > > Ken Davenport > > > > Hi Ken, > > > I'd like to comment on the policy of conserving contributor codes. I know it's not your policy, you're just following directions. But I recommend fighting it as much as possible. The Lep Soc is concerned about dwindling membership, so wants to be inclusive. And in general I am impressed with how welcoming the Lep Soc is to amateurs and newcomers. However, the policy of listing records under the name of more seasoned lepsters seems completely contrary to that. I wonder how many first-time submitters are discouraged from making any further submissions due to what must seem like a "Good Old Boys" mentality. I would gladly be PGJ37 if it meant that more people could feel welcomed into the Lep Soc. > > > Please share this message as appropriate. > > > Thanks, > > > Paul > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------- > From: "kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com" > To: DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com > Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2011 10:27 AM > Subject: [SoWestLep] 2011 Season Summary in progress > > > > Everyone: > > I am currently hard at work in compiling the report for the 2011 Season Summary with Arizona being worked on first. Thanks for helping me get that locality name problem worked out for Grand Canyon National Park and what a name it was! I am currently working up new codes for some new contributors that in the past have been given credit through others reporting or sponsoring records to conserve available code letters and numbers. Those getting codes this year include at least Gary Jue, Carl Lundblad and Marcelline VandeWater. > > It was a great year for Ascia monuste in Arizona and I plan to publish many of those records which are supported by actual specimens or photos. > > I have little more time to work on the Season Summary today. I expect to finish Arizona tomorrow and likely with get into the California Report (I got your report Alex G.) tomorrow. I also have a lot of BAMONA records to fix so it is an extremely busy time of the year for me. > > Nice comments from many of you on potential areas of overlap on Juniper Hairstreaks (Callophrys (Mitoura) gryneus-siva). It appears there is much more area of contact (eastern NM, W Texas, Nebraska) to study (has anyone done rearing studies on these? Are there larval differences?). I suspect it will be some time before we are confident how all of these really are related. Based on some results I have seen, DNA results were surprising and unexpected. And we need to do work on larger sampling numbers because some results seem contradictory based on results and conclusions by different researchers. > > Aren't we glad we have such issues to confound us during the winter season? > > Best Wishes, Ken Davenport > kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > ------------------------------------ > > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" � 1999 > > Subscribe: TILS-leps-talk-subscribe AT yahoogroups.com > Post message: TILS-leps-talk AT yahoogroups.com > Unsubscribe: TILS-leps-talk-unsubscribe AT yahoogroups.com > For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org > > > Subject: Fw: Re: Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:30:30 -0800 Todd: The suggested ID was just "Papilio polyxenes" Ken Davenport. ----- > > Hi Ken, > > I'm kind of curious about the mididentified larval record of polyxenes in > Lassen County. Was it intended to be ssp. asterius or coloro? > > P. p. coloro last instar larvae tend to look quite different to P. > zelicaon; but some forms of asterius can be quite similar. I know you > know that I know that coloro flies nowhere close to Lassen County, > California; let alone asterius; but was curious as to which ssp. the > misidentified larva was intended to be. > > Thx, Todd > > > > Todd L. Stout > Utah Lepidopterists' Society > http://www.utahlepsociety.org/toddstout.html > todd_stout29 AT hotmail.com > 801-558-6302 > > TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" 1999 > > > > > > To: mormonmetalmark AT yahoo.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; > DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com > From: kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com > Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2011 18:09:02 -0800 > Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Re: Fw: [SoWestLep] Progress on Zone 3 Season > Summary > > > > > > > > > Brian: > > You are absolutely right and with agarithe and philea I want a photo or an > actual specimen. Either species in California are very poorly supported > with almost all "records" based on "I saw". This year I received a photo > from Palm Desert from a person claiming he had an Orange Sulphur (Colias > eurytheme) photo. I checked it to verify and behold, he actually had a > Phoebis agarithe on a flower! With data. That is going in the summary. > Yes, I do listen to feedback on purported records from Kilian Roever, Jim > Brock and you. In fact one sight record for Phoebis philea in California > is not going in because of issues just like this you brought up with me > sometime ago. You know how picky I've been with demanding proof when it > was your philea records in question. > > That is also a hazard in submitting records for the Season Summary LATE. I > may not have time to verify ID's or data. In such cases, publishing a > valid record may have to go on hold an extra year. That can be true with > my records as well, I have not yet received verification of what my > purported Veined Blues (Plebejus neurona) from the Temblor Range in San > Luis Obispo County are from Paul Opler. So those records remain in > unconfirmed status for now. > > As far as giving such feedback in the Season Summary. You are all getting > the feedback now. Questionable records are almost always left out of the > Season Summary report and often I will let the contributor know why. But I > cannot discuss every single record I reject with contributors because of > limited time, usually it is because the record is not unusual, newsworthy > or a species folks are interested in (yes, that is a factor), or not > supported by photos or collected specimens in the case of rare butterflies > or significant range extensions or out of range occurrence (Papilio > polyxenes in Lassen County, California was one I rejected yesterday). The > latter was a caterpillar photo that was probably P. zelicaon. In case of > doubt, please rear these to adult and then show me a photo! > > Ken Davenport > > " As is always the case, I have not chosen to use all records > submitted to me for the Season Summary (I think by now, we all know > Cloudless Sulphurs (Phoebis sennae) occur in Madera Canyon, Arizona)." > > Ken, I am admittedly hijacking the topic but is there ever room in the SS > for commentary/feedback regarding records and reports? The Phoebis mention > quoted above reminded me of what I think is a real issue in > reporting--misidentification of Phoebis. I think there should be some kind > of vetting or review process for P. agarithe records, meaning a > requirement of a photograph of the live insect or specimen. This is > particularly a problem with sight records but collectors can do it too, > particularly if they are not familiar with the three Phoebis. > > It is my contention that the vast majority of P. agarithe sightings away > from residential Lysiloma that occur after the monsoons are misidentified > orange female sennae. Sennae females get darker as the year progresses and > the temperature cools, resulting in, by October, several that are oranger > than the orangest agarithe. On-wing, they do not appear as clear and > bright as real agarithe do. When they land, they can be told by their > redder undersides and more pointed wingshape, especially in the hindwings. > This same confusion sometimes happens with philea, but less commonly as > philea is generally twice the size of sennae. > > Brian > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > ------------------------------------ > > Subject: Re: Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary From: Todd Stout <todd_stout29 AT hotmail.com> Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:06:40 -0700 Hi Ken, I'm kind of curious about the mididentified larval record of polyxenes in Lassen County. Was it intended to be ssp. asterius or coloro? P. p. coloro last instar larvae tend to look quite different to P. zelicaon; but some forms of asterius can be quite similar. I know you know that I know that coloro flies nowhere close to Lassen County, California; let alone asterius; but was curious as to which ssp. the misidentified larva was intended to be. Thx, Todd Todd L. Stout Utah Lepidopterists' Society http://www.utahlepsociety.org/toddstout.html todd_stout29 AT hotmail.com 801-558-6302 TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" 1999 To: mormonmetalmark AT yahoo.com; SoWestLep AT yahoogroups.com; DesertLeps AT yahoogroups.com From: kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2011 18:09:02 -0800 Subject: Fw: [DesertLeps] Re: Fw: [SoWestLep] Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary Brian: You are absolutely right and with agarithe and philea I want a photo or an actual specimen. Either species in California are very poorly supported with almost all "records" based on "I saw". This year I received a photo from Palm Desert from a person claiming he had an Orange Sulphur (Colias eurytheme) photo. I checked it to verify and behold, he actually had a Phoebis agarithe on a flower! With data. That is going in the summary. Yes, I do listen to feedback on purported records from Kilian Roever, Jim Brock and you. In fact one sight record for Phoebis philea in California is not going in because of issues just like this you brought up with me sometime ago. You know how picky I've been with demanding proof when it was your philea records in question. That is also a hazard in submitting records for the Season Summary LATE. I may not have time to verify ID's or data. In such cases, publishing a valid record may have to go on hold an extra year. That can be true with my records as well, I have not yet received verification of what my purported Veined Blues (Plebejus neurona) from the Temblor Range in San Luis Obispo County are from Paul Opler. So those records remain in unconfirmed status for now. As far as giving such feedback in the Season Summary. You are all getting the feedback now. Questionable records are almost always left out of the Season Summary report and often I will let the contributor know why. But I cannot discuss every single record I reject with contributors because of limited time, usually it is because the record is not unusual, newsworthy or a species folks are interested in (yes, that is a factor), or not supported by photos or collected specimens in the case of rare butterflies or significant range extensions or out of range occurrence (Papilio polyxenes in Lassen County, California was one I rejected yesterday). The latter was a caterpillar photo that was probably P. zelicaon. In case of doubt, please rear these to adult and then show me a photo! Ken Davenport " As is always the case, I have not chosen to use all records submitted to me for the Season Summary (I think by now, we all know Cloudless Sulphurs (Phoebis sennae) occur in Madera Canyon, Arizona)." Ken, I am admittedly hijacking the topic but is there ever room in the SS for commentary/feedback regarding records and reports? The Phoebis mention quoted above reminded me of what I think is a real issue in reporting--misidentification of Phoebis. I think there should be some kind of vetting or review process for P. agarithe records, meaning a requirement of a photograph of the live insect or specimen. This is particularly a problem with sight records but collectors can do it too, particularly if they are not familiar with the three Phoebis. It is my contention that the vast majority of P. agarithe sightings away from residential Lysiloma that occur after the monsoons are misidentified orange female sennae. Sennae females get darker as the year progresses and the temperature cools, resulting in, by October, several that are oranger than the orangest agarithe. On-wing, they do not appear as clear and bright as real agarithe do. When they land, they can be told by their redder undersides and more pointed wingshape, especially in the hindwings. This same confusion sometimes happens with philea, but less commonly as philea is generally twice the size of sennae. Brian [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: Re: Fw: [SoWestLep] Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2011 18:09:02 -0800 Brian: You are absolutely right and with agarithe and philea I want a photo or an actual specimen. Either species in California are very poorly supported with almost all "records" based on "I saw". This year I received a photo from Palm Desert from a person claiming he had an Orange Sulphur (Colias eurytheme) photo. I checked it to verify and behold, he actually had a Phoebis agarithe on a flower! With data. That is going in the summary. Yes, I do listen to feedback on purported records from Kilian Roever, Jim Brock and you. In fact one sight record for Phoebis philea in California is not going in because of issues just like this you brought up with me sometime ago. You know how picky I've been with demanding proof when it was your philea records in question. That is also a hazard in submitting records for the Season Summary LATE. I may not have time to verify ID's or data. In such cases, publishing a valid record may have to go on hold an extra year. That can be true with my records as well, I have not yet received verification of what my purported Veined Blues (Plebejus neurona) from the Temblor Range in San Luis Obispo County are from Paul Opler. So those records remain in unconfirmed status for now. As far as giving such feedback in the Season Summary. You are all getting the feedback now. Questionable records are almost always left out of the Season Summary report and often I will let the contributor know why. But I cannot discuss every single record I reject with contributors because of limited time, usually it is because the record is not unusual, newsworthy or a species folks are interested in (yes, that is a factor), or not supported by photos or collected specimens in the case of rare butterflies or significant range extensions or out of range occurrence (Papilio polyxenes in Lassen County, California was one I rejected yesterday). The latter was a caterpillar photo that was probably P. zelicaon. In case of doubt, please rear these to adult and then show me a photo! Ken Davenport " As is always the case, I have not chosen to use all records submitted to me for the Season Summary (I think by now, we all know Cloudless Sulphurs (Phoebis sennae) occur in Madera Canyon, Arizona)." Ken, I am admittedly hijacking the topic but is there ever room in the SS for commentary/feedback regarding records and reports? The Phoebis mention quoted above reminded me of what I think is a real issue in reporting--misidentification of Phoebis. I think there should be some kind of vetting or review process for P. agarithe records, meaning a requirement of a photograph of the live insect or specimen. This is particularly a problem with sight records but collectors can do it too, particularly if they are not familiar with the three Phoebis. It is my contention that the vast majority of P. agarithe sightings away from residential Lysiloma that occur after the monsoons are misidentified orange female sennae. Sennae females get darker as the year progresses and the temperature cools, resulting in, by October, several that are oranger than the orangest agarithe. On-wing, they do not appear as clear and bright as real agarithe do. When they land, they can be told by their redder undersides and more pointed wingshape, especially in the hindwings. This same confusion sometimes happens with philea, but less commonly as philea is generally twice the size of sennae. Brian [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Subject: Fw: Progress on Zone 3 Season Summary From: <kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com> Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2011 01:51:31 -0800 Thanks Ray: Since you were a long time Season Summary Coordinator who did the Rocky Mountain states zone and were a key player in putting together county records and maps for butterfly distributions used now by everybody (including NABA), you KNOW what is involved. What has happened that has been a change in recent years. It has gone from nearly all collectors contributing to the Summary to an increasingly knowledgeable group of watchers and photographers and many of those are now using nets as an aid to identification or making of a small collection themselves. Many of those are seeking help from regional experts in their parts of the country. It is true that the Eastern USA is not as well known in terms of county lists as the WEST. One reason is counties in the East are smaller. Another is that Robert Langston (the previous long term Coordinator for the Southwest), you and the rest of the Team exerted themselves to achieve our goal of making complete county lists for the Western USA. I don't think there was such a Team in the East. That project under the guidance of you, Langston and Paul Opler was a project I shared in for 15-20 years or so and led to my becoming the regional Coordinator for Zone 3. It has opened up doors that led to my publishing two faunal publications though I was publishing articles and scientific papers regularly since 1980. That job has benefits, being consulted for information for research being done by others, contributing butterflies for museum collections, DNA work and chemical studies and knowing where things are going with research before most others do. While we all wish we could know definitively what the correct arrangement of species and subspecies are...current studies we hoped would tell us seem to raise even more questions. So it seems I have been doing this now for 12 years. It seems most are appreciative of my efforts and supportive. There have been others who have condemned me as an EVIL collector or criticized me for not accepting their records for one reason or another (there were a few times I did not handle that too well) but I think most realize we have to collect some to really study butterflies. As is always the case, I have not chosen to use all records submitted to me for the Season Summary (I think by now, we all know Cloudless Sulphurs (Phoebis sennae) occur in Madera Canyon, Arizona). But almost everyone that contributes records and regularly uses Leps Serves including those who do not use a net seem to well understand and agree to provide photos and other specific information that facilitates making our yearly report based on correct ID's and credible. Thanks to Richard Bailowitz, I have the very oldest Season Summaries back to about 1950. Many of those yearly reports were very poorly done. Under Langston"s direction for the Southwest, they markedly started to improve about 1971. They markedly improved again in the early 1990's when the Society adopted a better publishing format of one record per line with another line available for comments...that is the line which explains the significance of the record. Leroy Koehn (the second year Chief of Coordinators) is asking all Coordinators to use that second line more. And he plans to use more photos in the Report. I agree that the annual Reports are better in some areas than others. That is why being a successful Coordinator is so time consuming, being pro active in getting others to send important records and letting others know what we are looking for over the Leps Serves, checking ID's before deadlines and getting feedback from others over purported "records." Not all reports or contributors are credible or knowledgeable. Anyone (even experts) can make identification errors (me included). So having a good Season Summary Report really is based on having a good team of Major League players and I think we have that now in Zone 3. Koehn extended the deadline for submitting records by a few days, so some late with their reports have had an extension. But don't dally, I have a back log of BAMONA records to fix. Plus, I will later have to review a galley proof for the Season Summary Zone 3 and fix errors, some always get through my personal proof reading. And computers act up too, for no apparent reason. Ken Davenport Ken, Of course, you are right, and at least one generation of previous Coordinators has/have agreed with you. Only important records should be published, and the importance is based somewhat on the space available and the available funding. You are doing a terrific job, and most of us should thank you for your efforts. Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and best wishes to all for the new year, 2012 !! Ray Stanford On Dec 21, 2011, at 7:12 PM, wrote: Everyone: The initial draft spread sheet is essentially completed for the 2011 Season Summary for the states of California, Arizona and Nevada. I have 117 records in so far. The amount of time put in over the year on those 117 records is tremendous. I put in additional new codes for contributors Ray Bruun, David Horner and Jim Dreier. While some may want every single record for every single person to end up in the Season Summary it is not going to happen. That would be a colossal task which would require phone book sized books for each state and paid full-time multiple Season Summary coordinators to make it happen. Yearly dues for the Lep Society to fund it would probably be thousands of dollars. I doubt many would read much of it. Just because someone takes the time to submit it doesn't mean its worthwhile information to publish. Contributors are encouraged to explain why they believe submitted records are worthy of being published. No one working on the Summaries are being paid and it is time consuming as is. The summary often appears months late because of its difficulty to produce. It is true some regional reports are more thorough than others. Coordinators in an ideal world will seek out records throughout the year and use that time to research and validate records of importance. Some do better than others. But of course, there is widespread difference of opinion of just what should be in those reports. When it becomes the rule to put in all records regardless of merit, I'll just resign because I just don't have that much time and the summary would become boring and endlessly redundant. Unless someone wants to pay me very big bucks to do it, which somehow I doubt. Best Wishes, Ken Davenport kdavenport93306 AT yahoo.com For more information: http://www.tils-ttr.org TILS Motto: "We can not protect that which we do not know" © 1999 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------