Most interesting US locations for butterflies in September?

[thejsonboss]

Hey, everyone.  I'm fairly new to all of this and would like to make a trip to somewhere in the US in September where the collecting would be most interesting.  I'm assuming the south is best (FL&CA have gotten good rains), but it's hard to get a solid feel of what to expect. 

[jhyatt]

thejsonboss,

I've occasionally seen a lot of species, and specimens, flying and feeding at Bidens flowers on US 17 roadsides in coastal south Georgia in September, but most everything is
getting a bit shopworn by that time of year. Not sure where I'd go to find something fresh at that time of year. Sometimes in the southern Appalachians there's a flight of
very large, fresh Colias about then. Most everything else in the mountains is tattered in September.

Good hunting,
jh

[exoticimports]

Mid and southern FL tends to be way past peak by then. Lots of nice colias in the NE that time of year but not much else.

[mikeh]

I depends what you are looking for as well. Some species fly very late in the year like Hesperia leonardus, Euphilotes rita and ellisi or Agathymus species. Many Desert Hemileuca also fly late in the year. Probably a visit along the Mexican border either in SE Arizona or the Rio Grande Valley in Texas would be most productive, especially since you may turn up the odd stray, although Covid is a wildcard this year.

[thejsonboss]

Jul 29, 2020 15:02:21 GMT -8 exoticimports said:

Mid and southern FL tends to be way past peak by then. Lots of nice colias in the NE that time of year but not much else.

What is the peak for FL? May?

[thejsonboss]

Jul 29, 2020 16:28:48 GMT -8 mikeh said:

I depends what you are looking for as well. Some species fly very late in the year like Hesperia leonardus, Euphilotes rita and ellisi or Agathymus species. Many Desert Hemileuca also fly late in the year. Probably a visit along the Mexican border either in SE Arizona or the Rio Grande Valley in Texas would be most productive, especially since you may turn up the odd stray, although Covid is a wildcard this year.

Not very picky as I'm inexperienced outside of tx. South Texas valley is nice, but I ran into a drug dealer with a rifle that turned me off from going down there alone.

[leptraps]

Try western Kentucky. Lot's of Euphyes, Poanes, Limenitis, and lots of great moths, lots of Papaipema.

There can be large Buckeyes and plenty of Sphingidae. It is a great area in mid to late September,give a week or so either way.

October is fabulous for Papaipema.

[foxxdoc]

See my note in field reports.

normally still pretty good in Sept. much better further south; Miami or Naples.

Tom

[58chevy]

The Lower Rio Grande Valley of TX has more butterfly species than anywhere else in the US. The area is the northern range limit for many Mexican species. I've been there several times and have never encountered drug dealers. Stay away from Mission, Tx because that town has outlawed butterfly collecting. October & November are the best months, but Sept. should be OK.

[trehopr1]

Hey 58 Chevy, do you know of any records or occurrences of some of the larger saturniid moths (in Texas) from Mexico or even Central America.
if some of the butterfly species can make it into Texas I would think that some of the mods could as well. Obviously sphingidae I am sure are well-known for this.
Wonder if Thysania agrippina has ever crossed over the border into Texas or beyond?
That one is known southern Mexico (Chiapas).

[58chevy]

I haven't heard of T. agrippina crossing the border, but T. zenobia breeds in TX. I've caught 3 of them in the Houston area. Rothschildia lebeau forbesi breeds in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. Eupackardia calleta is also a S. TX regular. Eumorpha labruscae & Cocytius antaeus occasionally wander into TX.

I found one possible record of T. agrippina from Florida:


Kimball (1965) reported the following for Thysania agrippina in Florida:

"There is a fine specimen of this in the University of Tampa collection, taken in Tampa by Prof. C. T. Reed, of the biology Department. Unfortunately the body has been eaten by Dermestes. It is, of course, a stray."
Charles P. Kimball (1897-1982) began collecting Lepidoptera, mostly moths, in Florida in 1946. After 1951, Kimball spent most of each year on Siesta Key, near Sarasota, FL (Heppner 2007). Kimball's study of Lepidoptera led to the 1965 publication of an annotated catalog for the state. His former base near Sarasota is approximately 40 miles south of Tampa.

According to Horace R. Burke (Professor Emeritus, Department of Entomology, Texas A&M University, pers. comm., 2004), Clyde Theodore Reed (1891-1985) was an incessant traveler, collector and scholar. He either attended, taught or administered at universities in Kansas, Maryland, New York, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Istanbul (Turkey!), Texas, (Fort Worth, Corpus Christi, & Kingsville), Tennessee, Arkansas, and Florida from 1910 to 1944! In 1944, Reed joined the University of Tampa as the head of the Department of Biology. In addition to insects, Reed collected bird skins, eggs and molluscs. He was interested in marine biology, botany, poetry, and religion as well as entomology. (Burke cited (Cattell 1949) as his primary reference on Reed.)

Reed obviously had many wide-ranging pursuits, but apparently the proper care, labeling and publishing of his records didn't get the attention they should have. Neither Kimball nor Heppner (2007) report a date for this specimen which strongly indicates that Reed's specimen lacked a label.

An old, unlabeled specimen of a primarily South American moth with no Caribbean population reported from Tampa raises questions about the validity of the record. Unfortunately, Reed's collection and any notebooks he had at the University of Miami were lost to fire. There may be more details on Reed's specimen among Kimball's papers at the McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity in Gainesville, FL. Heppner (2007)

Florida has the highest percentage of exotic species of any state except Hawaii. Frank & McCoy (1992) found 271 exotic insect species reported in the literature for the first time between 1971 and 1991. By 1994, Frank & McCoy (1995) estimated that the number of exotic insect species present in Florida at about 1,000. They report that "some of them [came] as fly-ins, but many as contaminants of cargoes." It's possible that Reed's specimen arrived in Florida by plane or ship cargo.

Kimball (1965) was apparently the source for Thysania agrippina's inclusion in Hodges et al. (1983).

[58chevy]

Here's an account of T. agrippina from Colorado:

In a "stories page" on the Butterfly Website, a writer describes seeing, as a 10 year-old "a huge moth flapping it wings against the window, trying to get into the building. Having developed a great interest in moths, I had learned much, and instantly knew this moth was a foreign, exotic visitor known as Thysania agrippina." He recounts the pursuit of the moth, from a diner to the street and back again. He concludes: "... I saw something useful and unusual about capturing the world's largest moth in Colorado Springs, several thousand miles away from its normal home in Brazil." So far as I know, this would be the northernmost record for this 11 inch T. agrippina, in the collection of John Hetzler.

[trehopr1]

Thank you 58Chevy for those accounts of Zenobia, Rothschildia, and Calleta. Those species accounts for sphinx are also notable given the species...
Strangely, I remember reading somewhere the account of some man capturing a T. agrippina somewhere in Colorado. I don't remember if it was at one time posted on the web but, that is where I think I saw it. I'm surprised I didn't save it.

Nonetheless, I am happy you have mentioned it and have found where this story is posted. Can you tell me under which specific storyline thread you saw it as I went to the butterfly website and there were just too many to look through.

I wonder if our member "Coloradeo" happens to know this collector in Colorado named John Hetzler. It's a pity the man never posted a picture somewhere of what must truly be the most unique find ever made in the continental United States.

I could see the Florida record being bogus because the specimen has no label and the man whose collection it was in was well-traveled. Florida also sees a lot of boat traffic which would give sound reason why such a species might be found there.
However, to of actually caught a White witch (T. agrippina) in a state not really near any of the coasts is extraordinary almost beyond belief...

I wish there was a way to see the specimen, the data and maybe hear something from The collector who actually owns it.

[coloradeo]

I don’t know John but he sounds like an interesting character!