So-so day in the #butterfly world here. Still not seeing the Hairstreaks or the Blues. Saw what I thought was a Lorquin’s Admiral but on photo-inspection turned out to be a Sister. Still seeing Orangetips, which are usually gone by now. The biggest catch was a Pale Swallowtail (maybe more than one). I was about to say the species are slowly coming out, but again the pictures reveal this guy already has major battle scars. Not sure what the story is there.
Very similar to the Tiger Swallowtail but it’s still fairly easy to distinguish them even in the field. Pale is, well, more pale. Its dark stripes are wider, and longer. Tends to be smaller as well. #butterflies
Tip of a butterfly tongue. Dr. Stephen S. Nagy. Montana, USA. 750x.
Butterflies have chemoreceptors, or nerve cells that open onto the surface of their exoskeleton & react to the presence of different chemicals. #butterflies#biology#science#photography#nature#wildlife
The day started out slow for #butterflies but once the sun actually came out about 1pm, there was more activity. Kinda too bad I was already headed back to my car when the pictures started getting better.
And later today I saw a male holly blue butterfly! Couldn’t get a decent photo with the wings open but was very excited that it was the second Holly blue in one day (a new record for me) the first had bigger dark patches so I could tell was not just the same butterfly coming round again.
I may have chased it around for a while before getting a close up photo on the Centaurea flower. #HollyBlue#Butterflies#naturePhoto#Bloomscrolling
Delighted to get a proper look at the holly blue again this year. It’s only the 3rd year of being recorded in the area.
A comma and a male orange tip also visited the garden this morning. #Butterflies#HollyBlue