gray hairstreak ~ 10/08/14 ~ Cooper Molera Garden

female gray hairstreak nectaring/mud-puddling on blue passion flower
female Strymon melinus pudica nectaring/mud-puddling on Passiflora caerulea

(Shapiro)

Passifloraceae

edited 10/29/14 - Honestly, I don't know how to label this activity.  Nectaring or mud-puddling? Drinking?  Her proboscis is obviously extended and in use on the flower in the first photo, but that's not where the nectar is located on the passion flower.  And, it's commonly reported that only males engage in mud-puddling to produce a nuptial gift (except female CA sisters).  Btw, mud-puddling is not limited to mud puddles.  Butterflies can get nutrients from sweat and poo, too, basically any moisture with salts and amino acids.  No kidding, hence why I've been preoccupied with poo, lately.  I have yet to witness this activity in person, and I'd love to.  I believe any moisture with sugars, even fruits and sap, constitutes nectaring.  I could be wrong; definitions seems so arbitrary sometimes.  Is the sepal sweet or salty?  Oh, to be a butterfly and taste with your feet!  I know she's a female, because her abdomen top is gray; males are orange. 

As a side note, Butterflies of Orange County states the females have "reddish" abdomens.  This is incorrect.  Other than a handful of errors to keep an eye on, UC Irvine's site is a relatively decent local resource for butterflies, of which there are not that many good ones that don't just steal information from printed books.

gray hairstreak ~ 07/17/14 ~ Podere di Farfalla

"Eh?  What's this?  You're going to take my picture?"

"No, please don't.  I'm not ready"

"Hold on a sec.  Let me spruce up a bit."

"OK, I'm ready.  Go ahead and take my picture."
male gray hairstreak perched on seacliff buckwheat
male Strymon melinus pudica perched on Eriogonum parvifolium 
Polygonaceae

What's not obvious in many of my pictures is how breezy it frequently is, which makes it very difficult to take clear shots of tiny butterflies even when they're perched on a plant.  I took the above set with the pocket camera held still while the buckwheat was waving about in the wind.  Seriously.  I've been loving the auto-macro feature on our 10-year-old Konica Minolta DiMAGE X50.  It's incredibly easy, although it's not as quick as I would like and only has 5 megapixels.  It's a shame it took us 9 years before we discovered this cool feature.  However, I'm worried that because of its age, it might crap out any day now.  I've been looking for a replacement and haven't found anything remotely equivalent.  I field tested other point-and-shoot cameras this summer and was less than pleased with the fuzzy not-really-macro results.  I'd welcome any suggestions for a replacement/addition to our Konica.

gray hairstreak ~ 06/01/14 ~ Pinnacles

 gray hairstreak

Strymon melinus
(Shapiro and Tenney)

I have another photo (a bit too fuzzy to post) where there's a hint of barely there orange on top of the abdomen.  And, given how pointy the butt is, I'm guessing it's a boy.  Female gray hairstreaks have gray colored abdomens.  I'm glad to have him for the count, even if he's a bit worn.  Fresh grays are quite stunning and reportedly very common.  I first caught him on woolly yerba santa, and then he hopped over to CA buckwheat for another pose.

I noticed I'm developing a fondness for butterflies that tend to perch at about my waist-height, and at Pinnacles that usually means CA buckwheat and woolly yerba santa.  They're the ones I'm most likely to capture a natural pose with my point-and-shoot.  I've really enjoyed looking at my own macro shots, because I'm seeing details that are impossible in-person.  It's kind of a funny thing, I have an excellent dissecting scope with snake lights and several pairs of binoculars, but I don't like using them as visual aids.  It's just one of those quirks.

gray hairstreak ~ 05/31/13 ~ Hatton Canyon

 

gray hairstreak

Strymon melinus

for more information, click here and here

I have a strange compulsion to want to watch hairstreaks and closely related blues rub their hindwings together, similarly to how I like to watch cats clean their faces by licking their paws. It's my understanding that the prevailing hypothesis for why they do this is "false head" complete with eyespots and fake antennae to detract would-be predators from the real deal.  But, what about bramble hairstreaks and blues that do not have eyespots or tails and still rub their wings together?  In any case, I was quite charmed by this little gray hairstreak casually rubbing those rear wings with the tails even getting tangled together.