[TN-Butterflies] houston county foy and bamona butterflies
- From: "Steve Stedman" <birdsongteam@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <tn-butterflies@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 8 Jul 2010 08:55:24 -0500
I visited Houston County yesterday and was able to find only a few butterflies,
not knowing the county at all and just wandering like a butterfly here and
there. I was able to locate only 18 species (all FOY), obtaining photos of 13
of those (BAMONA), which brought the county butterfly list up out of the
single-digit dungeon in which it has languished for many a moon.
The Eastern Tailed-Blue was one of my objectives, and I found it, lots in fact.
That leaves only Bedford, Lawrence, and Robertson as counties in TN without a
documented BAMONA record for tailed-blue, putting that species closest to being
the first species to be documented in all 95 counties.
Pearl Crescent also became a BAMONA victim yesterday in Houston County, leaving
only Crockett, Hickman, Johnson, and Robertson as counties without a BAMONA
record for the pearl.
Here is the list for the day, paltry as it may be:
Sachem 5 (photo)
Pipevine Swallowtail 3 (photo)
Eastern Tiger Swallowtail 23
Spicebush Swallowtail 5
Orange Sulphur 30 (photo)
Little Yellow 1 (photo)
Sleepy Orange 1 (photo)
Eastern Tailed-Blue 45 (photo)
Summer Azure 5 (photo)
American Snout 1 (photo)
Variegated Fritillary 1
Silvery Checkerspot 7 (photo)
Pearl Crescent 5 (photo)
Question Mark 1
Common Buckeye 5 (photo)
Red-spotted Purple 22 (photo)
Hackberry Emperor 9 (photo)
Carolina Satyr 2
I will be putting my data into the NABA BIS site in a few minutes. I urge all
Tennessee butterfliers to take advantage of this resource, as the data in BIS
may one day provide the butterflies of North America with a lot of support for
protection of various sorts, habitat preservation, etc. Some folks say that
keeping numbers of the butterflies you see is too much like work, but it's
really like any sport where you keep score. You can play golf without keeping
score, but who does? You can go on a butterfly count without keeping track of
how many butterflies you see, but you'll be surprised at the way this is viewed
by others on the count. Keeping count every trip is not that hard to do, and
it keeps you ready for those butterfly counts as they occur.
I plan a trip to Bedford and Lawrence counties next week to look for and
photograph Eastern Tailed-Blue in each county. That will leave Robertson
County as the sole remaining tailed-blue hold-out. Richard Connors--can you
get there this summer and get a photo?
Good butterfly counting, Steve Stedman
Cookeville (Putnam County)
Note: the map of Tennessee for Eastern Tiger Swallowtail at BAMONA shows it to
be undocumented in 8 counties, one of which is Loudon, but Doug Bruce did find
and photograph a tiger in Loudon back in April, so there are just 7 remaining
counties without a documented tiger record, with 5 of those occuring in West
Tennessee and 2 in Middle Tennessee.
Also note: there will be a butterfly count July 24 that will include the Head
of Sequatchie in southern Cumberland County and some of northern Bledsoe
County. Come on over if you want to see this new public site.
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