Last Saturday a group of Rio Brazos Auduboners and TMNers
participated in the North American Butterfly Association’s (NABA) Butterfly
Count at Lick Creek Park. Why were we out
there? From NABA’s website:
“Three
of the main goals of NABA’s Butterfly Count Program are to (1) gather data that
will monitor butterfly populations, (2) give butterfliers a chance to socialize
and have fun, and (3) raise public awareness by hosting events that will
increase general interest in butterflies.”
The nice thing about watching butterflies is that they get
up late… so we began the count at 9:00am! We started off by walking down Iron Bridge
Trail and the group quickly spread out.
Now, the other nice thing about going on a butterfly count is that it’s
a great chance to learn butterflies. I
was one of the people in the group that doesn’t really know a lot… the big ones
are easy but the medium-sized orange and black ones all look the same to
me. But this weekend, I learned how to
tell two of the little orange and black guys apart!
Compare a Silvery Checkerspot with a Pearl Crescent. A Silvery Checkerspot will be a little larger and have more oranges and browns on the wings. A Pearl Crescent is going to be a little bit
smaller and mostly orange and black when the wings are open.
When the wings are closed, you can kind of see the same thing. Thanks Bruce for all the pointers!
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| A Silvery Checkerspot (left) and a Pearl Crescent (right) with wings open. Note the Checkerspot has more browns and is lighter orange than the Pearl Crescent. |
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| A Silvery Checkerspot (left) and a Peral Crescent (right) with wings closed. Note the lighter wings on the Checkerspot. |
Cool butterflies that were seen include those in the picture
below. Note! I did not take these (or any) pictures… I stole them
from Rick!
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| Common Buckeye! |
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| Gray Hairstreak! |
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| Great Purple Hairstreak! |
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| Pipevine Swallowtail! |
It’s also not just about butterflies. When they’re few and far between we all start
looking at other things. It’s nice when
you get a few people together who know a lot about a lot of stuff and they’re
more than happy to share their knowledge!
Crossing the bridge over Lick Creek on Deer Run Trail, Dwight pointed
out the potholes in the streambed from where male sunfish have hollowed out the
area and are guarding their own nest site.
That’s not something I would have noticed on my own or if I did, I
wouldn’t have known what was going on.
Thanks for pointing the fish out, Dwight!
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| Fish potholes in Lick Creek. You can see five potholes in the upper right corner of the photo in the red circle. |
Other notable finds were a singing Summer Tanager and several Red-eyed
Vireos along Deer Run Trail and a Six-lined Racerunner along Iron Bridge
Trail.
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| Six-lined Racerunner along Iron Bridge Trail. |
And how can I forget dragonflies!!
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| Common Whitetail! |
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| Halloween Pennant! |
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| Female Roseate Skimmer! |
After Lick Creek Park, the group broke up into smaller
parties to continue the counts in backyards and other parks.
All in all it was a great day to be outside, learning
butterflies and seeing what was out and about in the park. Thanks to everyone who came out! And thanks, Rick... for letting me steal your wonderful pictures!
Resources:
Books / Publications:
Butterflies of Central Texas The link takes you
to Amazon but you can find this locally at state parks, Martha’s Bloomers, and
even HEB.
Texas Parks and Wildlife Publication:
Website:
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