Colonel Devin Trail Butterflies
My butterfly group went on our annual butterfly hunt on the Colonel Devin Trail this past Saturday (just 1.5 hrs from home).
We didn’t see the 39 species our leader had documented on her scouting trip two weeks prior but they saw 33 and I personally saw 25 species! That’s a record for me. Here is what I saw: Two-tailed Swallowtail, Orange Sulphur, Southern Dogface, Dainty Sulphur, Gray Hairstreak, Western Green Hairstreak (Bramble), Western Tailed-Blue, Spring Azure, Acmon Blue, Melissa Blue, Zela Metalmark, Variegated Fritillary, Field Crescent, Mylitta Crescent, Satyr Comma, Painted Lady, Red-spotted Purple, Arizona Sister, Mourning Cloak, Common Buckeye, Silver Spotted-Skipper, Pacuvius Duskywing, Rocky Mountain Duskywing, Checkered-Skipper, Taxiles Skipper.
Most butterflies are VERY small and typically not approachable so if you combine that with a very windy day, photography is a challenge. This year I took only my Canon SX50 and although it was extremely frustrating achieving focus many times (due to busy backgrounds), I was very pleased. For one thing, even a 500mm lens would not have captured some of the tiny beauties because they were too far away but mainly it was liberating be be free of the weight my normal DSLR setup! Most of my images are cropped to about half of the full frame which means about 2000px on the long side. This is still large enough for books which is my main goal these days. Here are some of my favorites. Click any image to open a slideshow. (Click individual images for full size and then use back button to return to blog.)
Another highlight of this trail is Wildflowers. We didn’t see as many flowers as usual because we went two weeks earlier this time. We didn’t want to risk a trail closure which happened last year due to fire danger. Here’s a collage of most of the flora I saw. Click image to see full size.
For those of you who wonder how on earth we can take the heat here in Arizona, please remember this post. We do not have to travel very far to enjoy much cooler weather in Pine Forests with streams!
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25 species! Wonderful photos…I have bookmarked your blog and will check in to keep up with you!
I really appreciate your visit, Michele! Thank you for your comment. (Look for more images soon). I just added your blog to my “feedly” reader so I’ll be notified when you post something new. I visit all your links often to get inspired by your work 🙂
Very nice post and presentation Marianne. I like the included “people shots”, giving some perspective on the environment too.
Subscribed with Google Reader + Feedly
🙂
Thanks, Peter! Happy you like the environment shots. I always try to include them because so many think Arizona is only desert. Being able to drive such a short distance to experience dramatically cooler weather makes the heat more tolerable 🙂
Right, eventually I have found your blog posts, as I had subscribed to your other one, which ends up with the mention of your book. (How many blogs do you have? lol)
You’ve seen more species in one day than I saw in my whole holiday! Quite incredible and fantastic that you managed such great shots of so many of them. Love the wild flowers too.
Thanks for your feedback, Mandy and sorry about the blog confusion! I’m flattered you went to extra lengths to find me :-). I only have two “active” blogs. (The other one (/mscblog) is meant for Conservancy related outings). When I joined G+ a couple of years ago, I thought my Conservancy blog would be my only one but I’ve become disillusioned with G+ and I really missed sharing things about my garden, bird and butterfly outings etc, so here I am again! Two insect surveys are coming up (one will be at night) so I’m hoping to have insects to share with you soon!
I really enjoyed these Marianne especially comparing your wildflowers to our Scottish ones. Surprised to see a few plants like columbines in flower with you too at the moment. Loved that pine image – from the thumbnail I didn’t realise that the colour was actually from a tree!
Thanks for commenting, Rosie! I, too, love seeing we (and other parts of the world) have many wildflowers in common. We only have the yellow ones in Arizona. Colorado has the lovely lavender color. I’m really happy you liked the Pine needle image. The new growth on these particular pines was so soft and SO green! I will be going back to this area in a couple of weeks and will post more wildflowers.
Hi Marianne: You’re back at the blog again I see. Yay, I’ve missed reading your blog, and as much as I intended to try out Google+, just never made it a priority. Then there were a few days on Instagram (thanks to Lori’s influence), but same thing there, just not a priority.
Hope to see more of your posts. The butterflies, BTW, are gorgeous. And that little bird on the metal bird is terrific!
So great to “see” you, Judy and thanks so much for your comment 🙂 Yes…I missed blogging and am happy to be back. I just checked your work, Judy. Very enjoyable! Loved your Anza-Borrego shots. Do you have a blog too? Let me know so I can add it to my Feedly (replaced Google Reader).
Yay! You’re back and much more accessible (to me). Looking forward to more posts.