Nature: Often finding what you’re not looking for is the most pleasant surprise

[George DeWolf]

If you regularly follow this Google Group, you may recall my recent post, “Hairstreak Surprise in Hudson—A First for NH!”, about an excursion Steve and Jane Mirick, Laurie Shepard, and I took to a powerline clearing that crosses Musquash Road in Hudson. We were there in search of a Hoary Edge that had been found in a section of the clearing just south over the border in Groton, Massachusetts. While we didn't find our target butterfly, we made an even more remarkable and unexpected discovery: the first record—on iNaturalist or otherwise—of the Northern Oak Hairstreak in the state of New Hampshire. A similar surprise awaited me just below the summit of Mount Washington on Sunday.

While attending the Squam Lakes Butterfly Count last week, I had the opportunity to chat with NH Fish & Game Wildlife Biologist Heidi Holman. Many of you likely know Heidi or are familiar with her work to conserve at-risk butterfly species such as the Karner Blue, White Mountain Fritillary, and White Mountain Arctic. During our conversation, she graciously offered to point me toward sites where the White Mountain Arctic would likely be found while she was on the mountain Sunday capturing females of the species for research. It was an opportunity I found difficult to pass up. I had never encountered this butterfly before, its flight period is very brief, and mid-July appears to be the peak of its annual activity.

Mount Washington is a fascinating habitat, made unique by its extreme prominence in the northeastern landscape. When you're up there, it helps to remember that a massive ice sheet once covered all of New England—including its highest peaks—forcing arctic-alpine species southward. As the ice sheet began to recede roughly 14,000 years ago, these tundra-adapted species followed it north. Most eventually settled nearly a thousand miles away in the far reaches of northern Canada, but a distinct group was left marooned on the cold-weather island we affectionately call “The Rock Pile.” These stranded species include the White Mountain Arctic and White Mountain Fritillary, as well as unique plants such as the cushion-forming Diapensia that I was carefully rock-hopping to avoid trampling. There are undoubtedly many other remarkable species up there, just waiting to catch the eye of an observant explorer and the lens of a camera.

While scrambling around the glacial scree just below the summit cone, I noticed a number of tiny moths flying up at my feet. Who knows how many species were represented, but I felt fortunate to get a clean photo of one and posted it to iNaturalist. None of the initial suggestions from iNat’s computer vision model were a close match, though the White Triangle Tortrix (Clepsis persicana) was morphologically similar. Suspecting this moth might be another relic stranded from its northern brethren, I ran an iNaturalist search of Clepsis species across Canada and hit upon Clepsis moeschleriana. Accounting for the usual intraspecific variation you expect in any species, it looked like a perfect match.

My observation has since been verified by a few folks with far more experience with this species than I. Remarkably, this appears to be only the second iNaturalist observation of this species in the United States south of the Canadian border—the other being above 10,000 feet near the summit of Tibbs Butte in Wyoming. Steven Lamonde confirmed there are 21 historical museum records for this species on Mount Washington dating between 1975 and 1990, and one of iNat’s leading tortricid identifiers, Jason Dombroskie, notes that it can also be found on Mount Katahdin in Maine.

I claim no special talent for finding it—just the good fortune that comes from the persistence to seek out something I’d never seen before. I hope this serves as a bit of inspiration to keep exploring and taking photographs. The most unremarkable insect or plant at your feet may have an incredible story to tell—in this case, a tiny, delicate moth that has successfully carved out a living in one of the harshest environments on Earth.

George