[ONbutterflies] American Snout at Adelard, Renfrew County

[Bill Lamond]

Hi,

Today (27 July) I saw an American Snout at Adelard, Renfrew County. This location is along the Ottawa River and is about 10k W of Stonecliffe or 45 km W of Deep River. It was nectaring on Virgin's Bower and Meadowsweet. In the 2-3 minutes it was present, I managed to get a few lousy cell photos.

This species is an immigrant to Ontario, usually only to the Carolinian zone but in the Butterflies of Ontario (2014) they list records for Algonquin Park and Manitoulin Island, and also several records for Ottawa over a few years at the Fletcher Wildlife Garden. These latter records suggest overwintering, but the species does not overwinter in Ontario and these multi-year occurrences at the same location are likely due to an abundance of the foodplant there (planted Hackberry) which the strays must zero in on. I am surmising that Hackberry is planted there. I have no information on this.

Interestingly, iNaturalist also shows multi year records in Ottawa for a same location, albeit at the Monahan Drain, E of Stittsville in 2019 and 2022 . It must be the same pattern of occurrence as for the above Ottawa records.

INat also shows recent records for the Quyon ferry landing in Ontario (2019), near Elliott Lake in 2024 and at North Bay in 2025. 

This species definitely has a tendency to "get up and go".

Bill

[Peter]

Hi Bill:

Saw your American Snout note on the ONbutterflies website. I can attest to the Ottawa area sightings as a number of these were my observations but entered into eButterfly. Others must have put similar sightings into iNaturalist (Rick Cavasin?). The Fletcher  garden location was, as you say, probably strays encountering the hackberry planted there (both older trees in the nearby arboretum and some new ones planted about ten years ago. The Monihan Drain sightings were in the same location in two different years. There are a few hackberry trees planted nearby. Sounds like your Stonecliffe sighting was also a probable stray. As we know, this species in some years has monster migrations from the southern US that sometimes wander north into Canada.

Cheers

Peter Hall

On 2026-07-27 11:54 p.m., Bill Lamond wrote:

Hi,

Today (27 July) I saw an American Snout at Adelard, Renfrew County. This location is along the Ottawa River and is about 10k W of Stonecliffe or 45 km W of Deep River. It was nectaring on Virgin's Bower and Meadowsweet. In the 2-3 minutes it was present, I managed to get a few lousy cell photos. The Monihan Drain area had a few hackberry trees which were probably planted in a nearby newer residential area

This species is an immigrant to Ontario, usually only to the Carolinian zone but in the Butterflies of Ontario (2014) they list records for Algonquin Park and Manitoulin Island, and also several records for Ottawa over a few years at the Fletcher Wildlife Garden. These latter records suggest overwintering, but the species does not overwinter in Ontario and these multi-year occurrences at the same location are likely due to an abundance of the foodplant there (planted Hackberry) which the strays must zero in on. I am surmising that Hackberry is planted there. I have no information on this.

Interestingly, iNaturalist also shows multi year records in Ottawa for a same location, albeit at the Monahan Drain, E of Stittsville in 2019 and 2022 . It must be the same pattern of occurrence as for the above Ottawa records.

INat also shows recent records for the Quyon ferry landing in Ontario (2019), near Elliott Lake in 2024 and at North Bay in 2025. 

This species definitely has a tendency to "get up and go".

Bill

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