Category: Butterfly

More droning

6/2/2016

First up this morning were the final two flights for the drone mapping.

The drone sends back a video feed from its camera so you can sorta keep an eye on it

They don't really land the drone, here Don McFarlane just grabs it out of the air as it hovers. Very slick.

And then other projects are moving along as well. Spiders are starting to get mapped and some wildlife cameras are being set up.

Naomi Fein and Chanchanok Sudta setting up wildlife cameras near the top of the property.

And a couple of our insect friends

Heliconius ismenius is a fabulous butterfly

Bees! This little hive is the best of both worlds. They make wonderful honey and do not, in fact, sting.

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Variegated Fritillary (Euptoieta claudia) from Meadowlark Gardens, Virginia

11/3/2015

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A very nice day in northern Virginia and Fall is upon us.

A late-season variegated fritillary (Euptoieta claudia) from Meadowlark Gardens, Virginia

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Great Spangled Fritillary (Speyeria cybele) from Troutville, Virginia

8/31/2015

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The great spangled fritillary is a mid to late summer butterfly. They are large, feed in the open, and are quite showy.

Great spangled fritillary (Speyeria cybele) from Troutville, Virginia

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A Few Photos From Dyke Marsh, Virginia

8/22/2015

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I was only in a little corner of the western side of the marsh. Would like to see more of this place.

Beautiful Tiger Swallowtail butterfly

A dragonfly, which I will have to look up later

A damselfly, which looks like a Familiar Bluet (Enallagma civile) but I will have to verify this

Juvenile swamp sparrow. Looks a lot like a juvenile song sparrow, but notice the bold streaking down the side of the breast, and no, that is not a black dot in the center of the chest

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Some critters

5/31/2015

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No rhyme or reason, just a few pics from the last two days.

My primary camera died due to humidity, but I got this with my back-up. A Virginia opossum (Didelphis virginiana)

A small agouti (Dasyprocta punctata) from the upper part of the Firestone Center

A tribe of coatis (Nasua naraica) were in the trees eating palm fruits

A King Butterfly (Papilio thoas) at night

The Common Paraque, a bird in the nightjar family

And finally, for tonight...

A red-eyed tree frog (Agalychnis callidryas)

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Two Pics

5/28/2015

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I don't have the field guide handy, but this looks like a scarlet-rumped tanager (male)

A Plain Longtail Skipper (Urbanus simplicius) from the Firestone Center

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Butterfly from Costa Rica, Firestone Center for Restoration Ecology

12/9/2014

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This is the butterfly I couldn't get up yesterday.

Looks like something in the Caliga genus, but I will leave this one unidentified.

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A correction and a few night pics

8/29/2014

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Seems like only four of us have been feeling poorly, so not quite "most of us." And several chicken-eaters had no problems. So the source of the troubles remains a mystery. But boy do the troubles hurt.

Last night I finally got back up to speed enough to take a short night hike after spending the day mostly in bed. And some pics from that bit are worth the wait.

An anole that was sleeping until I came along

This thing is amazing. I have no idea what it is so will need more time for an ID, but worth posting

Connor holds a Truando toad (Rhaebo haematiticus)

Another sleeping butterfly.

A "tink" frog, but don't have time to ID it

This looks like a small tarantula, and a spider I have not seen here before. Will take a bit of work to ID this one

A tailless whip scorpion (Amblypygidae)

Not sure if I got this species of owl butterfly on the blog yet, so here it is (Caligo sp.)

And, as a final test of my ID skills, I present what appears to be a terrestrial planarian. Which, I note, I have no clue about it other than it appears to be a planarian and is pretty cool.

This looks like a terrestrial planarian (flat worm), but certainly a critter I can't find and place easily.

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Last pics from the night hike

8/26/2014

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At some point I have to stop posting things from the night hike, but we saw a lot of great critters. So here are the last two.

A sleeping butterfly (with a little caterpillar in the background)

One of several toads we saw along the road

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Firestone Center, Costa Rica day two

8/25/2014

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First order of business today is to note that I have competition!!! The students are blogging their trip, so to get all the goods on the trip you should also check out:

costaricathesis.wordpress.com

From what I've seen so far they are putting up a pretty fun bit.

From my end, I led an orientation walk of the whole property this morning, and only took one photo. The golden silk spider (Nephila clavipes) makes big webs, and apparently can capture big prey.

Golden silk spider (Nephila clavipes) with an owl-eye butterly (Caligo sp.). The spider is about four inches long

Afterwards, I went over and got a new machete for Connor. Greddy, the land manager for the Firestone Center was kind enough to put a sharp edge on it.

Machetes come very dull. But Greddy fixed that up

And then dinner and well, another hike up the hill to look for frogs and other things that can only be found at night in the tropical forest. I will note that it is something like 800 feet of elevation gain to get up to the ponds with the frogs and such, so it is not a trivial bit to get up there.

But on the way up we saw:

A nice moth with colorful underwings

Katydids making katydids

Looks like a tree cricket

A pretty rough-looking owl butterfly (Caliga sp.)

And then there is the stuff we saw at the top of the Firestone. Very fun evening on top of the hill.

The first critter was this giant spider on a banana plant

This neon-colored grasshopper was a new one for me on the property.

And of course there were red-eyed tree frogs (Agalychnis callidryas), but not as many as we see earlier in the summer

Wasps, check that box, as they are always around

Cool looking dragonfly

Frogs were a key part of the night walk, but I don't have the time or materials to identify them right now. I will post more photos, and hopefully have the IDs, later

Near the end of the walk up on top, we spotted this leaf-legged bug (probably Genus Anisoscelis) which was beautiful

I have a couple more interesting pics from the hike, but will have to put them up tomorrow as too darn late here to do more. Gotta sleep at least a little bit.

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More droning

Variegated Fritillary (Euptoieta claudia) from Meadowlark Gardens, Virginia

Great Spangled Fritillary (Speyeria cybele) from Troutville, Virginia

A Few Photos From Dyke Marsh, Virginia

Some critters

Two Pics

Butterfly from Costa Rica, Firestone Center for Restoration Ecology

A correction and a few night pics

Last pics from the night hike

Firestone Center, Costa Rica day two

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