September 2023 Sightings

Incidental sightings while birding in the park today. Also made a brief stop at the gardens on the way out.

Obs. 11.40-13.10
My goal for to today was to photograph the Sleepy Orange. I was lucky to capture a mating pair and I was able to shoot some macro's. All the SO's looked very fresh.

[Good to see this apparent stronghold for sleepy orange continues to hold them in numbers. jc]

Obs. made between 3:50 & 4:40. Found another Crossline here nectaring on NY Ironweed. Only checked out the garden & the surrounding fields.

A beautiful and relaxing day watching birds and butterflies despite being nearly decapitated several times by a spirited bunch of hummingbirds.

Sunny, 70 degrees, ENE winds around 14mph. More or less incidental sightings while doing field work. Glad to see a brief male Pipevine Swallowtail pass west from Coral x Oxford around 10am. FOY Fierys for me at Triangle Park.

[Good finds – including only our 2nd report of pipevine swallowtail in 2023. A troubled species having a worrisome year. jc]

2:50 to 4:40 pm. Sunny, temps in the mid 70s. Also two Harvester caterpillars.

Woodland trails: Least Skippers very abundant in wet areas, Eastern Comma, Appalachian Browns," Summer" Spring Azures and Pearl Crescents (19 of 20).

Obs. made from 12:50 to 3, sunny and near 80. Was focused on finding Crossline Skipper today. As it turned out I mis-identified one in the field as Tawny-edged but after reviewing my images it was Crossline. Spent most of my time between the butterfly garden and the dredge pit. 80% of the Sachems were found on eupatorium around the perimeter of the pit.

White M hasn't been seen here for a number of years.

[Excellent find of white m in CAM! We have had only one other CAM report of the species (Matt Webster in Cedarbrook on 10-7-2-2021) since your last one from your yard on 8-30-19.
jc]

Low's 70's, sunny, perfect weather conditions.
Common wood nymph was a first time sighting for this location.

[Good to see an addition to the site's list – and that you are compiling all the site lists you have been. Keep at it! jc]

Obs. made between 12:10 & 2:50, sunny and near 80. Most of the Sachems were on Hyssop-leaved & Late-flowering Thoroughwort.

[Riverwinds showing off its superb diversity…thanks to Dave A. jc]

Obs. from 2:55-3:30.

Walked the CSA flower garden area at the PPA. Lots of Sulphurs on a long section of Verbena. Counted 15 Orange Sulphurs but there were more flying around the area.

Minimal observation today. E.Tiger showed up late afternoon. A fresh female.

8:25 am to 1:20 pm. Sunny, breezy, 88 degrees when finished. Thoroughwort the main nectar source with some thistle in bloom as well. Tawny-edged Skippers preferred thistle whereas Crosslines were mostly on thoroughwort. Also six unidentified skippers (either Tawny-edged or Crossline).

Obs. 11.00-12.15. Temps in the low 80’s. Incidental sighting while looking for and photographing Praying Mantis.

Cloudless Sulphur laying eggs on Senna. Peck's new for this year. Sachems continue.

Obs. made from 4-6:20, sunny and 92 degrees. Observed at least 7 Harvesters today, 2 males and 5 females. The females were all ovipositing. One image appears to be of a cluster of eggs. I have only observed single egg laying previously. It is no surprise that they are still active since they have such a short development cycle, about 3 weeks. It was also interesting to see the changes to the forest floor post tornado. I mentioned previously an abundance of Tulip Poplar saplings. Now there are numerous stands of Thoroughwort and Goldenrod.

[Superb documentation of ovipositing by this beguiling, unorthodox species. jc]

Lots of action in the garden today.

[Jack Miller has identified the photo'd skipper as a "golden" sachem. This is his term for particularly yellow sachems. He notes the keys for separating from Delaware visible here:

"Golden sachems display a fine black (dark) submarginal line on the hw (the line is also present on the submarginal fw, but sometimes less pronounced) that Delawares lack. Also, upon close inspection of Karen's photo, there are slightly darker areas near the outer 'tips' of both the fw and hw."

Jack believes "golden" sachems can be easily mis-ID'd as Delawares and that we should be more alert to this possible mix-up.

Thanks to Jack for his help with this ID and the alert. jc]

3-3:30 pm, sunny and 95 degrees. Found wooly aphids on the upper path on beech trees, but no Harvester activity. Walked to the stream and on the return walk found 2 flying and landing on low branches. Another individual spotted flying on the muddy bank of the stream bed.

[Very cool find! The last report of harvesters in Saddlers Woods was by Sandra Keller 8-10-2014, nine years ago. jc]

Observations while working in the garden. Snout new this season. Early instar Monarch caterpillar.

The RSP today was the first one here in many weeks and is only the 4th this year, making this is a record breaking low year for the species here (the highest single day count here for rsp is 27). I went through this summer's reports for RSP on the SJBP log and noticed that although reported almost daily, numbers are usually just 1 or 2. There are still Sootywing cats in the yard.

From my neighbors flower garden and plantings.

Obs. from 10:45-11:40. The majority of the skippers were either on New York Ironweed or the Sedum. The Spicebush Swallowtail was very tattered. Skipper cats evident in various stages on black locust saplings. Photo taken at night with flash.