Amherst QM, RSA, etc

[Josh]

Howdy leppers,

Our dog and I crossed paths with a Question Mark today, on Allen Mill Road in Amherst, near Amethyst Brook. Allen Mill is a gravel-surfaced road, and apparently contained minerals that the critter wanted. The vast majority of Polygonia sp. here disappear before I can get a really identifiable look at them, and I usually assume them to be E. Comma, but this one repeatedly returned to the road after it flushed, until I finally got a decent enough binocular view to confirm its punctuation.

Other butterflies in our yard over the past few hours:

Red-spotted Admiral - an intergrade, no mid-wing white but the white arc near the forewing apex was longer and more obvious than usual
Monarch - ovipositing on milkweeds by our neighbors’ driveway
Great Spangled Frit - nectaring on our Wild Bergamot (Monarda fistulosa) which just started blooming

Things seems skewed in favor of the big guys so far this summer, with not a single hairstreak sighting yet, very few azure/ETB types, and skippers pretty sparse as well beyond a few SSS’s, though did glimpse a probable Common Sootywing in our driveway yesterday.

Cheers,

Josh


Joshua S. Rose, Ph.D.
Amherst, MA
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/opihiman
https://www.facebook.com/opihi

Writer/compiler, Bird Observer
https://www.birdobserver.org/

Columnist, “Earth Matters”
https://www.gazettenet.com/search?bodysearch=earth+matters
https://www.hitchcockcenter.org/category/earth-matters/

Vice-president, Hampshire Bird Club
https://hampshirebirdclub.org/

Northeast Chapter head, Dragonfly Society of the Americas
https://www.dragonflysocietyamericas.org/northeastdsa