Post by jshuey on Sept 9, 2013 10:43:51 GMT -8
Finding that old photo of Enodia creola for the "Lethe eurydice??" post in the Bug identification forum reminded me of the two silly articles I wrote many years ago for the Newsletter of the Ohio Lepidopterists. Here is the first installment from 1994 (man, I'm getting old!). It is pretty long, and I apologize.
Shuey
_____________________________
A Day in the Life of a Lepidopterist, Hoosier Style: A Historical Dramatization with Extraneous Glorifications
Every now and then you have one of those days in the field that makes life seem great. Well let me tell you, life seems pretty good in Indiana since last week.
All summer long, I've been telling myself that I really needed to head to southern Indiana to see if I can re-locate Enodia creola (the creole pearly-eye) in the State. Despite the range maps in most popular butterfly books, this elusive butterfly has been reliably reported only once from Indiana. Apparently in 1965, a Dr. E. M. Brackney reported a single male from near the Patoka River in Orange County (Masters & Masters, 1969). Knowing that the Patoka River valley is known to support the hostplant, native bamboo or cane (Arundinaria), I decided that there is no reason to doubt the record. Further, because cane is still found in scattered locations throughout extreme southern Indiana, I had no doubts that creola was still around, lurking undetected, in the shadows along some creek bank. Others don't necessarily hold my views, and the Indiana DNR considers creole to be extinct in Indiana, primarily because it hasn't been sighted for almost 30 years.
So, armed with information about the location of a few of the larger stands of cane, I decided that I had to look for this elusive species. Besides, if I didn't act soon, I'd have to wait until next summer. My plan was simple: I'd arrive as early as possible at a potential site, hang a couple of bait traps, and spend the rest of the day exploring other areas in the region. Then, at the end of the day, I'd return to traps bulging with creola, and I'd be a hero for rediscovering this rare species and I'd probably get my picture on the cover of Newsweek or Time or something like that. This all seems reasonable.
August 24th was the chosen date for action and I, like all prudent and modern lepidopterists, arose before dawn and turned on the Weather Channel (cable TV has become a vital tool for us wimps who don't like rain). Once I was convinced that the weather would eventually cooperate, I hit the road and a mere three hours later I was near Siberia, Indiana.
Now, Siberia is a much warmer area than it sounds, and in fact lies in the "banana belt" of Indiana. Southern influences are obvious in the forests and even the weeds, where kudzu, the great plague of the south reaches its northern limit and envelopes acres of forest in its vines. The road to town lies along a creek bottom, and patches of cane are common in the area. After driving the length of this road, I selected the most accessible and largest patch of cane for my traps. Almost as soon as I wandered from the car, I spotted a pearly-eye dancing at the forest edge! I dumped the traps and bait, and scrambled back to the car for my net: only then did I realize that there were pearly-eyes all over the place! Jeeze, it looked like I would be home for lunch. I quickly netted a few specimens and was really enjoying my little adrenaline rush when I finally looked in my killing jar - four northern pearly eyes in all - Enodia anthedon - common, scum-of-the-earth-butterfly. Only then did I notice all the grass hostplant growing in the woods and along the road. I humbly retrieved my traps and trudged into the cane to hang them. I really should have known better. After all, Dave Iftner had just told me that you rarely see creole flying, and that the only way to really find out if they are around is to bait for them. None-the-less, after hanging the traps I decided that I should really investigate as many of the pearly-eyes as possible, just to make sure that one of them wasn't the prized creole. I wandered around netting and eventually releasing every pearly-eye in the area, some of them twice I bet. Finally giving up and heading towards the car, I saw it. Not the big crisp eye-spots of creole, but the whitish-blur of a skipper. I had only seen this white skipper-blur once before in my entire life - Amblyscirtes aesculapius, the laced-wing skipper. I knew immediately what this insect was and I was acutely aware that it had never before been reported from Indiana. This type of knowledge has serious drawbacks in the field, because it usually produces a severe neurological disorder called "impaired net-swing syndrome" or "collectors clutch". Doctors are actively debating the exact cause of this syndrome, but in my case its pretty straight forward. In my excitement of seeing a really cool butterfly, my brain quickly overloads with one ricocheting thought, which is essentially "yoweeee, look at that butterfly!" This occupies over 90% of my cerebrum, forcing my brain stem to assume control of voluntary limb movements. I'm not kidding - I went to Ohio State and I know these things. But anyway, this time it was different: the little skipper settled on its cane hostplant, and with a single arm spasm, I netted him. He is now immortalized as the first documented occurrence of his kind from Indiana.
Thus armed with new adrenaline I decided to move on and let the bait traps do their thing in my absence. Although I had a couple of specific sites that I wanted to visit, I figured that simply driving around Perry County would turn up some habitats that were likely to yield interesting species. The first area I wanted to see was a sandstone glade community. Glades are small open grasslands that resist trees and shrub development because of very thin soils and bedrock which is at or above the soil. Most glades in the Midwest are pretty small, and most people don't even notice them because they are usually surrounded by forests. (There is a picture of one in Iftner et al, 1992, Plate 5, row 2, left photo, which gives a pretty good idea of how small and inconspicuous sandstone glades can be). This one sounded pretty interesting, and I decided to try to find it. Well, as it turns out, this one is pretty easy to find - in fact you can see it for miles. It stands on the edge of a bluff overlooking the Ohio River. The only problem being that it stands on a bluff overlooking the Ohio River - about 150 feet directly vertical from the road. Having absent-mindedly left my mountaineering equipment back at the office, I quickly decided to move along. My next planned stop was a creek bottom and I was pretty sure I could handle that, typically being downhill and all. Many of the creeks in this part of Indiana are intermittent streams, with broad gravel bottoms, usually with no water. I wanted to look at some of these because they seemed like potentially good spots for southern immigrants as well as southern species in general.
I was headed to Boone Creek, but about five miles or so from my destination I drove right through a very large stand of cane along Little Oil Creek. I had to stop and take a look for creola. At this site, the cane grows in an open powerline right-of-way on one side of the road, and in the wooded creek bottom on the other side. I decided to look at the right-of-way, and right a way noticed a bunch of little metalmarks flying in the ditch. This being late August, seeing metalmarks didn't make much sense to me. Calephelis borealis is single brooded and flies in mid-July. These butterflies were as fresh as could be, and didn't show any wing-wear. Calephelis muticum is also single brooded in Indiana and besides, its only known from fens in the extreme northern part of the state - what could it be doing down here? The only other remote possibility was Calephelis virginiensis, but I know that insect and this wasn't it. After pondering the possibilities, I decided that this metalmark had to be the swamp metalmark (C. muticum). I knew that in Missouri, the species is double brooded, and I also knew that the species had been recorded from northern Kentucky and there are no fens there. This occurrence in extreme southern Indiana is pretty incredible, especially given how common the species was at the site. Looking around, I saw no evidence of the known hostplants for either of the midwestern metalmarks. There were some thistles, the reported host of muticum, about 50 meters away, but no metalmarks could be found around them, despite the abundant nectar sources in that area. Who knows what the host is here.
My enthusiasm buoyed by the mystery metalmarks, I plunged into the creek bottom and spotted a small satyr flying through the cane. It landed and I immediately recognized it as Hermeuptychia sosybius, the Carolina satyr and another species new to Indiana! This time "impaired net-swing syndrome" got the best of me, and I sent the little guy into outer-space. The impact of his body on my net rim actually produced a pleasant ringing sound that could be heard for several miles. By the time I calmed down, I spotted another small satyr, and even managed to net it. But as soon as I looked into the net, I knew I only had a gemmed satyr (Cyllopsis gemma), rare in Indiana but not worthy of the cover of Time magazine. I continued to search diligently, thinking that the sosybius might not be consumed by fire as it re-entered the atmosphere, but no dice - I did not see another individual. Feeling disgusted that I blew such an important catch, I was preparing to leave. Towards the car, I spotted a small, black skipper resting on a fern, and I casually swept it up as I usually do with small nondescript skippers. Once in the jar I realized this was a species I had never before collected, and I honestly wasn't too sure what it was. It was obviously an Amblyscirtes of some sort, but I didn't recognize it off the top of my head. I'd have to use a reference to identify this skipper, which means I'd have to wait until I was back home. It turns out that it was Bell's roadside skipper (Amblyscirtes belli), and this is likely just the second time it has been collected in Indiana. According to Shull (1987), the only other Indiana record of belli was taken by Mark Minnow in 1975, just 10 miles or so from where I found it.
By the time I finally arrived at Boone Creek it was getting to be late afternoon. Muticum was common along the roadside here too, and I collected a couple more specimens, including the only female I had seen all day. Along the creek bottom were openings dominated by prairie grasses - the big bluestem towering over my head, and lots of neat forbs like purple coneflower and blazing star. By this time, I was just plain expecting some exotic butterfly to jump into my net, but it wasn't happening. I wandered down the dry creek bed into the forest, where I decided that I should start collecting at least a voucher of some of the common species I was seeing, when I saw two small dark butterflies chasing one-another, as males often do, through the shadows and dappled sunlight. After watching this skitterish action for a minute or so, I figured that whatever these things were, they were never going to stop this wild chase. Most likely, I was going to lose sight of them as they swirled off into the forest. As impaired as I am, I took a wild swing and I obviously missed. As I watched one crazed and panicked butterfly scamper down the stream bed, I remembered that there were two. I looked at my net and discovered my state voucher for H. sosybius. By now I'm pretty much out of adrenaline, so big deal. I yawned and decided I'd better get home.
Heading back north towards Siberia, I visualized my final glory - traps bursting at the seams with creola and who knows what else - a real hero's welcome after a hard days work. Once there, I found traps bursting with exactly one red-spotted purple (Limenitis arthemis astyanax) and a bald-faced hornet. I guess you can imagine my disappointment later, when during my long, dark, drive home, I realized that neither Time or Newsweek, or even the National Inquirer would be featuring my profile - given my complete failure to rediscover my rare target species. But maybe next year, when I hope to have a little better luck.
LITERATURE MENTIONED
Iftner, D. C., J. A. Shuey and J. V. Calhoun. 1992. The butterflies and skippers of Ohio. Ohio Biological Survey, New Series, Vol.9 No.1., 212 pages.
Masters, J. H. and W. L. Masters, 1969. An annotated list of the butterflies of Perry County and a contribution to the knowledge of Lepidoptera in Indiana. Assoc. Minnesota Entomol. 6: 1-25.
Shull, E. M. 1987. The butterflies of Indiana. Indiana Acad. Sci. and Indiana Univ. Press. Bloomington and Indianapolis, Indiana. 262p.
Shuey
_____________________________
A Day in the Life of a Lepidopterist, Hoosier Style: A Historical Dramatization with Extraneous Glorifications
Every now and then you have one of those days in the field that makes life seem great. Well let me tell you, life seems pretty good in Indiana since last week.
All summer long, I've been telling myself that I really needed to head to southern Indiana to see if I can re-locate Enodia creola (the creole pearly-eye) in the State. Despite the range maps in most popular butterfly books, this elusive butterfly has been reliably reported only once from Indiana. Apparently in 1965, a Dr. E. M. Brackney reported a single male from near the Patoka River in Orange County (Masters & Masters, 1969). Knowing that the Patoka River valley is known to support the hostplant, native bamboo or cane (Arundinaria), I decided that there is no reason to doubt the record. Further, because cane is still found in scattered locations throughout extreme southern Indiana, I had no doubts that creola was still around, lurking undetected, in the shadows along some creek bank. Others don't necessarily hold my views, and the Indiana DNR considers creole to be extinct in Indiana, primarily because it hasn't been sighted for almost 30 years.
So, armed with information about the location of a few of the larger stands of cane, I decided that I had to look for this elusive species. Besides, if I didn't act soon, I'd have to wait until next summer. My plan was simple: I'd arrive as early as possible at a potential site, hang a couple of bait traps, and spend the rest of the day exploring other areas in the region. Then, at the end of the day, I'd return to traps bulging with creola, and I'd be a hero for rediscovering this rare species and I'd probably get my picture on the cover of Newsweek or Time or something like that. This all seems reasonable.
August 24th was the chosen date for action and I, like all prudent and modern lepidopterists, arose before dawn and turned on the Weather Channel (cable TV has become a vital tool for us wimps who don't like rain). Once I was convinced that the weather would eventually cooperate, I hit the road and a mere three hours later I was near Siberia, Indiana.
Now, Siberia is a much warmer area than it sounds, and in fact lies in the "banana belt" of Indiana. Southern influences are obvious in the forests and even the weeds, where kudzu, the great plague of the south reaches its northern limit and envelopes acres of forest in its vines. The road to town lies along a creek bottom, and patches of cane are common in the area. After driving the length of this road, I selected the most accessible and largest patch of cane for my traps. Almost as soon as I wandered from the car, I spotted a pearly-eye dancing at the forest edge! I dumped the traps and bait, and scrambled back to the car for my net: only then did I realize that there were pearly-eyes all over the place! Jeeze, it looked like I would be home for lunch. I quickly netted a few specimens and was really enjoying my little adrenaline rush when I finally looked in my killing jar - four northern pearly eyes in all - Enodia anthedon - common, scum-of-the-earth-butterfly. Only then did I notice all the grass hostplant growing in the woods and along the road. I humbly retrieved my traps and trudged into the cane to hang them. I really should have known better. After all, Dave Iftner had just told me that you rarely see creole flying, and that the only way to really find out if they are around is to bait for them. None-the-less, after hanging the traps I decided that I should really investigate as many of the pearly-eyes as possible, just to make sure that one of them wasn't the prized creole. I wandered around netting and eventually releasing every pearly-eye in the area, some of them twice I bet. Finally giving up and heading towards the car, I saw it. Not the big crisp eye-spots of creole, but the whitish-blur of a skipper. I had only seen this white skipper-blur once before in my entire life - Amblyscirtes aesculapius, the laced-wing skipper. I knew immediately what this insect was and I was acutely aware that it had never before been reported from Indiana. This type of knowledge has serious drawbacks in the field, because it usually produces a severe neurological disorder called "impaired net-swing syndrome" or "collectors clutch". Doctors are actively debating the exact cause of this syndrome, but in my case its pretty straight forward. In my excitement of seeing a really cool butterfly, my brain quickly overloads with one ricocheting thought, which is essentially "yoweeee, look at that butterfly!" This occupies over 90% of my cerebrum, forcing my brain stem to assume control of voluntary limb movements. I'm not kidding - I went to Ohio State and I know these things. But anyway, this time it was different: the little skipper settled on its cane hostplant, and with a single arm spasm, I netted him. He is now immortalized as the first documented occurrence of his kind from Indiana.
Thus armed with new adrenaline I decided to move on and let the bait traps do their thing in my absence. Although I had a couple of specific sites that I wanted to visit, I figured that simply driving around Perry County would turn up some habitats that were likely to yield interesting species. The first area I wanted to see was a sandstone glade community. Glades are small open grasslands that resist trees and shrub development because of very thin soils and bedrock which is at or above the soil. Most glades in the Midwest are pretty small, and most people don't even notice them because they are usually surrounded by forests. (There is a picture of one in Iftner et al, 1992, Plate 5, row 2, left photo, which gives a pretty good idea of how small and inconspicuous sandstone glades can be). This one sounded pretty interesting, and I decided to try to find it. Well, as it turns out, this one is pretty easy to find - in fact you can see it for miles. It stands on the edge of a bluff overlooking the Ohio River. The only problem being that it stands on a bluff overlooking the Ohio River - about 150 feet directly vertical from the road. Having absent-mindedly left my mountaineering equipment back at the office, I quickly decided to move along. My next planned stop was a creek bottom and I was pretty sure I could handle that, typically being downhill and all. Many of the creeks in this part of Indiana are intermittent streams, with broad gravel bottoms, usually with no water. I wanted to look at some of these because they seemed like potentially good spots for southern immigrants as well as southern species in general.
I was headed to Boone Creek, but about five miles or so from my destination I drove right through a very large stand of cane along Little Oil Creek. I had to stop and take a look for creola. At this site, the cane grows in an open powerline right-of-way on one side of the road, and in the wooded creek bottom on the other side. I decided to look at the right-of-way, and right a way noticed a bunch of little metalmarks flying in the ditch. This being late August, seeing metalmarks didn't make much sense to me. Calephelis borealis is single brooded and flies in mid-July. These butterflies were as fresh as could be, and didn't show any wing-wear. Calephelis muticum is also single brooded in Indiana and besides, its only known from fens in the extreme northern part of the state - what could it be doing down here? The only other remote possibility was Calephelis virginiensis, but I know that insect and this wasn't it. After pondering the possibilities, I decided that this metalmark had to be the swamp metalmark (C. muticum). I knew that in Missouri, the species is double brooded, and I also knew that the species had been recorded from northern Kentucky and there are no fens there. This occurrence in extreme southern Indiana is pretty incredible, especially given how common the species was at the site. Looking around, I saw no evidence of the known hostplants for either of the midwestern metalmarks. There were some thistles, the reported host of muticum, about 50 meters away, but no metalmarks could be found around them, despite the abundant nectar sources in that area. Who knows what the host is here.
My enthusiasm buoyed by the mystery metalmarks, I plunged into the creek bottom and spotted a small satyr flying through the cane. It landed and I immediately recognized it as Hermeuptychia sosybius, the Carolina satyr and another species new to Indiana! This time "impaired net-swing syndrome" got the best of me, and I sent the little guy into outer-space. The impact of his body on my net rim actually produced a pleasant ringing sound that could be heard for several miles. By the time I calmed down, I spotted another small satyr, and even managed to net it. But as soon as I looked into the net, I knew I only had a gemmed satyr (Cyllopsis gemma), rare in Indiana but not worthy of the cover of Time magazine. I continued to search diligently, thinking that the sosybius might not be consumed by fire as it re-entered the atmosphere, but no dice - I did not see another individual. Feeling disgusted that I blew such an important catch, I was preparing to leave. Towards the car, I spotted a small, black skipper resting on a fern, and I casually swept it up as I usually do with small nondescript skippers. Once in the jar I realized this was a species I had never before collected, and I honestly wasn't too sure what it was. It was obviously an Amblyscirtes of some sort, but I didn't recognize it off the top of my head. I'd have to use a reference to identify this skipper, which means I'd have to wait until I was back home. It turns out that it was Bell's roadside skipper (Amblyscirtes belli), and this is likely just the second time it has been collected in Indiana. According to Shull (1987), the only other Indiana record of belli was taken by Mark Minnow in 1975, just 10 miles or so from where I found it.
By the time I finally arrived at Boone Creek it was getting to be late afternoon. Muticum was common along the roadside here too, and I collected a couple more specimens, including the only female I had seen all day. Along the creek bottom were openings dominated by prairie grasses - the big bluestem towering over my head, and lots of neat forbs like purple coneflower and blazing star. By this time, I was just plain expecting some exotic butterfly to jump into my net, but it wasn't happening. I wandered down the dry creek bed into the forest, where I decided that I should start collecting at least a voucher of some of the common species I was seeing, when I saw two small dark butterflies chasing one-another, as males often do, through the shadows and dappled sunlight. After watching this skitterish action for a minute or so, I figured that whatever these things were, they were never going to stop this wild chase. Most likely, I was going to lose sight of them as they swirled off into the forest. As impaired as I am, I took a wild swing and I obviously missed. As I watched one crazed and panicked butterfly scamper down the stream bed, I remembered that there were two. I looked at my net and discovered my state voucher for H. sosybius. By now I'm pretty much out of adrenaline, so big deal. I yawned and decided I'd better get home.
Heading back north towards Siberia, I visualized my final glory - traps bursting at the seams with creola and who knows what else - a real hero's welcome after a hard days work. Once there, I found traps bursting with exactly one red-spotted purple (Limenitis arthemis astyanax) and a bald-faced hornet. I guess you can imagine my disappointment later, when during my long, dark, drive home, I realized that neither Time or Newsweek, or even the National Inquirer would be featuring my profile - given my complete failure to rediscover my rare target species. But maybe next year, when I hope to have a little better luck.
LITERATURE MENTIONED
Iftner, D. C., J. A. Shuey and J. V. Calhoun. 1992. The butterflies and skippers of Ohio. Ohio Biological Survey, New Series, Vol.9 No.1., 212 pages.
Masters, J. H. and W. L. Masters, 1969. An annotated list of the butterflies of Perry County and a contribution to the knowledge of Lepidoptera in Indiana. Assoc. Minnesota Entomol. 6: 1-25.
Shull, E. M. 1987. The butterflies of Indiana. Indiana Acad. Sci. and Indiana Univ. Press. Bloomington and Indianapolis, Indiana. 262p.
