Summer Butterflies – June 22, 2005

The heat really brought out the butterflies. There were still lots on the driveway, but some of the species changed since last week.
This week there were very few Milbert’s Tortoiseshells, and lots of both Silvery Checkerspots and dark Eastern Commas. And in the part of the driveway that goes through the wetland, nearly all the butterflies were Baltimore Checkerspots.

These are the driveway butterflies I saw this week:

Milbert’s Tortoiseshells
Great Spangled Fritillaries
Silvery Checkerspots
Northern/Pearl Crescents
Red-spotted Purples
Viceroys
Eastern Tailed Blues
Eastern Commas – summer dark form
Baltimore Checkerspots
Painted Ladies
Red Admirals

In other places I saw
Cabbage Whites
Tiger Swallowtails
Monarchs
Eyed Browns
one Artic Skipper
other Skippers

It’s often easier to photograph butterflies on the driveway – when they’re drinking up salts, they tend to be calmer and less likely to fly when I come close.

Here’s a dark Eastern Comma.

Some Silvery Checkerspots from above

And here you can see the underside of the wings.

Here’s one of the Baltimore Checkerspots on the driveway.

This is a Dusted Skipper. The key feature is the white above and below the eye.
I checked with Mike Reese and he agrees with that ID.