acmon blue on naked buckwheat ~ 09/10/14 ~ Podere di Farfalla

mating acmon blue (male top, browner female bottom) on naked buckwheat

mating Icaricia acmon (aka Plebejus acmon) on Eriogonum nudum var. auriculatum
Polygonaceae

I mentioned in a previous mating acmon post on seacliff buckwheat from mid-July about how host plant associations cannot be assumed.  I'm trying to do a better job at documenting the butterfly, the plant, and the activity.  Here I found them on another type of buckwheat (one that was not evident to me back in July).  I was able to get a series of mating photos that made for a surprisingly graphic gif.  Unfortunately, after succumbing to a fit of giggles, I decided other people may not appreciate my crass animal p0rn humor (or it might get stolen and put on a site I would be embarrassed to show my grandmother, if you know what I mean).  And so, it's not included on Nature ID.  However, it was eye-opening to see how butterfly sexy parts actually fit together.  I never took such a close look before.

acmon blue laying egg on naked buckwheat
Icaricia acmon laying egg on Eriogonum nudum var. auriculatum

This is the true money shot for me.  Laying an egg on an identified host plant.  Although, as I witnessed this spring, females sometimes get their host plants mixed up.  No kidding.  It's apparently how insects regularly adapt to using introduced plants.  It's evolution in action.  At the time, I was encouraged to find the egg of my unusual sighting.  Ha!  I tried, I really did.  It's very much like looking for a needle in a haystack.  Miniaturized.  What's not always obvious from photos is exactly how small all of this is.  I seriously doubt I'll be able to get a clear picture of something as tiny as an acmon egg out in the wild, on a cliff, in bright sun, and the ever-present wind.  With my relatively recent need for reading glasses, I couldn't even see what the egg here looked like after the female did her quick drop off.  I'm starting to view television nature shows in an entirely different light now and not in a good way.  Instead of oohing and awing over nature, I'm wondering how the heck they managed to film whatever it is that they did.  Seriously.  Eh, I like my easy crappy photos.  So, on to the plant...

naked buckwheat / ear-shaped wild buckwheat

Eriogonum nudum var. auriculatum

Polygonaceae

While I already suspected which buckwheat this was, I used the plant list for Podere di Farfalla to narrow down the possibilities of buckwheats, from 256 spp./var. found in all of CA to just 6, plus 4 more from nearby Garland Ranch.  I looked at all the possibilities, and more, just to make sure it wasn't something I hadn't heard of before.

oblong leaves along lower part of stem, wavy margin, spider webby on top, 

and solidly fuzzy below

(my descriptive words, nothing to do with plant keys)

The official CNPS list for Garland Ranch shows another of the 14 var. of naked buckwheat (geez, there's a lot), sometimes called hairy flowered buckwheat or Fremont's wild buckwheat (E. nudum var. pubiflorum).  I took a close look at the few available photos online, and I think the leaves here look more like auriculatum than pubiflorum.  Leaf shape more determinate over level of fuzz on top?  It's a close call, and I could be wrong.  If anyone knows better, please tell me!

a step-back view 

(See?  Crappy.  Bright butterfly sun and waving plants in the wind do not mix.)

Melissa blue ~ 07/25/14 ~ Sierra Valley

male Melissa blue

Lycaeides melissa (aka Plebejus melissa)

female Melissa blue

Lycaeides melissa (aka Plebejus melissa)

I'm thrilled I was able to take a close look at Melissa blues, which were flying with look-alike acmon blues at Art's Sierra Valley site.  These are L. melissa melissa, but closer to home we might have L. melissa paradoxa.  I'm hoping to find Melissa in Monterey Co. (only an old historical record) and at Pinnacles in San Benito Co. (never been reported).  Years ago, I visited the Kitty Todd Preserve in northwest Ohio the year after they reintroduced the endangered Karner blue (L. melissa samuelis, aka Plebejus samuelis).  I remember it being sandy under oaks with plenty of lupine, so I'm thinking Fort Ord might be as good as any for potential Melissa habitat.  Who knows?  I'll definitely be taking a closer look at every acmon I think I see.

Given my proclivity to mainly get pictures of only the underside (ventral) wing surfaces, I attempted to determine sex based on the amount of fading of the orange spots towards the apex of the forewing, with females more heavily marked with orange.  However, I've been assured that this is not entirely reliable, and it's best to just look at overall ground color, with a bluish tinge for the males and a hint of brown for the females, a subtle difference compared to those same respective colors on the topside (dorsal).

acmon blue on seacliff buckwheat ~ 07/17/14 ~ Podere di Farfalla

mating acmon (male left, browner female right) on seacliff buckwheat

mating Icaricia acmon (aka Plebejus acmon) on Eriogonum parvifolium (var. parvifolium)

Polygonaceae

Having both acmon blue sexes in the same photograph is very helpful, because I've had some difficulty distinguishing between them on their own, since lighting and wing angle can be so variable and deceptive.  Ya, I know, I've been told repeatedly, "Get a photograph of the topside (dorsal), then it's easy to tell them apart."  Ha!  As if it were that easy!  I'm thrilled whenever I can get any photograph at all that's not a total fuzzy blob.  Seriously.  And, after seeing numerous butterflies in a day, I never can remember if the topside of butterfly #34 was blue or brown while it flew away.  Maybe other people have an easier time of it?  This is only my second photo of mating butterflies that I've managed to get all year.  The first were Edith's checkerspots back in May at Pinnacles.  As with the Melissa blues, the female acmon blues have a browner ground color on the underside (ventral).

I'm noting the plant they're perched on while they do their thing, but that may not mean much.  While I do have other photographs of worn female acmons nectaring on seacliff buckwheat, I don't have any photographs of egg-laying on this plant.  It cannot be assumed seacliff buckwheat is the larval host plant of these acmons.  I didn't notice any other buckwheats or lotuses in bloom in the area, which also may not mean much.  In any case, I thought this would be a good time to showcase this lovely local buckwheat...

tight pom-pom shaped multi-colored mature pink blooms

narrow arrow-shaped leaves, cobweb top and felty bottom

seacliff buckwheat from a distance

(it apparently likes "cliffs" with a marine influence)

another pair of mating acmon blues on a drier seacliff buckwheat flower head
(browner female left, male right)

ps 11/21/14 - Jim Reveal confirmed this ID, and if he recognized varieties, he'd call this var. parvifolium.

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.

acmon blue ~ 07/10/14 ~ Podere di Farfalla

acmon blue (blue male top, brown female below) nectaring on tocalote

Icaricia acmon (aka Plebejus acmon) nectaring on Centaurea melitensis

Asteraceae

Gorgon copper ~ 06/05/14 ~ Chews Ridge

female Gorgon copper

Lycaena gorgon
(Shapiro and Tenney)

They're all look-alikes!  Heavy sigh.  At first, I confused the female Boisduval's blue with the Gorgon copper with that split orange couplet dotting towards the butt when their wings are held at rest above their body.  Now that I'm looking at this picture, there's a definite chalky white that I've also noticed in the great copper and is totally absent in all the blues I've seen so far.  Also, I think I might get the topside female with its golden-hued window panes mixed up with the similarly looking tailed-copper.  I have yet to get a good look at females topside in-person, because I didn't bother this one too much except to take its picture.  She looks heavy with eggs and lots of fat.  In flight, the boys flash a beautiful alternating leathery brown with white, only a couple feet off the ground.  They're quite distinctive.

Boisduval's blue ~ 06/05/14 ~ Chews Ridge

Boisduval's blue

Plebejus icarioides

female Boisduval's blue

Plebejus icarioides

Now, here's a butterfly with a fancy French name!  Jean Baptiste Boisduval was a famous lepidopterist, among other things, and I often see his name associated with the naming of numerous butterflies.  Chris Tenney introduced me to Boisduval's on my first ever visit to Chews Ridge back April 17, 2014.  It looked so similar to the silvery blue I saw the previous week on April 8 at Pinnacles, that I spent some time really comparing the two and even consulting with Art Shapiro.  I have netted pics of a couple extremely worn Boisduval's from a May 2 visit to Chews Ridge, which I haven't posted yet.  So, I'm guessing these here are the 2nd generation this year.  

Since I rarely get pics of the full-on topside, I've had to rely on the underside markings.  See the white-outlined, curvy row of black spots and then the black spots closer towards the wing edge (submarginal) on both the fore and hindwings (particularly in the middle picture above)?  Well, Boisduval's will always have a hint of those submarginal black spots, even when really worn, and silvery never does.  

The real point of this post is that I know the bottom picture is absolutely a female with a brown topside and hints of orange on the hindwing underside with an extra row of dots (Good grief, it looks just like a Gorgon copper from the underside!), but I can't really say for the first set.  Another form of female?  Or is it a boy?  Does anyone know?  Erg.  I should mention that green sheen in the first photo is not always evident.  Usually, it just looks black.

tailed copper ~ 06/03/14 ~ Pinnacles

tailed copper

Lycaena arota

(Shapiro and Tenney)

For such a plain Jane name, this tailed copper really packs a beautiful design punch in such a small package.  It was surprisingly quick, and I only managed 2 photos before it took flight.  I believe this was a male, if I recall the solid topside leather brown color correctly.  The female topsides have golden-hued window panes that seem to glow in a classic butterfly pattern.  I read their caterpillars eat gooseberry.  And, once again, that's CA buckwheat serving up tasty butterfly energy drinks.

CA hairstreak ~ 06/01/14 ~ Pinnacles

California hairstreak

Satyrium californica

(Shapiro and Tenney)

Here's another worn-torn individual shown nectaring on CA buckwheat.  It's superficially similar to the grey hairstreak, down to similar bite marks out of the hind portion of their wings.  Those tail-end bright spots sure seem to do their job in keeping these little snack-sized morsels alive long enough to get to the worn-torn looking stage.  Cool beans.  I wonder what the spots look like under UV for bird predators?  Girl?  I can't tell.

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.

great copper ~ 05/27/14 ~ Pinnacles

great copper on curly dock

Lycaena xanthoides on Rumex crispus

 Polygonaceae

I will never malign curly dock again!  Surprisingly, this invasive weed is the common host plant for this remarkably large copper.  This butterfly is easy to spot with its bright chalky white.  And the topside isn't exactly copper, but more of a moth brown.  In flight, I mainly see the flash of white, because the brown just looks like shadow.  I believe this is a boy staking his claim to this perch of curly dock, because he repeatedly came back to this exact spot after chasing flirty wings.

sylvan hairstreak ~ 05/23/14 ~ Pinnacles

sylvan hairstreak / willow hairstreak

Satyrium sylvinus dryope

(Tenney)

Compare the above to what most sylvan hairstreaks look like.  Notice something missing?  Like tails?  No, they're not broken off, like what frequently happens.  This fatty female(?) never had them, hence the ssp. dryope.  Crazy, huh?

lupine blue ~ 05/20/14 ~ Pinnacles

lupine blue on California buckwheat
Plebejus lupini on  Eriogonum fasciculatum var. foliolosum
(Shapiro and BugGuide discussion)
Polygonaceae

edited 08/15/14 - I initially wrote a bunch of hooey about bloom times and timing of butterflies, which I've deleted for how utterly ignorant it was, and once again I've changed my mind about this ID from acmon back to lupini.  I tend to think of the non-early-spring female acmon as definitely having a true brown ground color, which this does not have.  Determination of female or male is still up in the air, because I've been told that male lupini can be quite dark like this (e.g., series of P. lupini monticola plates).  My understanding is the whole group of acmon/lupini is currently being revised.  So, for now, I can only make my best guess.

lupine blue ~ 05/13/14 ~ Pinnacles

lupine blue laying egg on California buckwheat
Plebejus lupini laying egg on Eriogonum fasciculatum var. foliolosum
(Shapiro and BugGuide discussion)
Polygonaceae

I told Art Shapiro about this day's visit, "Blues are numerous at Pinnacles with swirly flights of flirting and cooling fluttering clouds under shady rocks.  I love it.  I only wish I could tell them all apart.  Ha!"  This beautiful little blue butterfly has caused me so much headache you wouldn't believe.  No one seems to agree.  There are many variations of lupine blues depending on region, and there's also the look-alike acmon blue (Plebejus acmon) with a blue-colored early spring form female.  Who knew, all this time I've had a hard time figuring them out, and the experts also have a hard time figuring them out.

I didn't know I caught one laying eggs in a series of several photos until I got home and looked at my pictures.  I was so concerned with quickly sticking the little camera over there to hopefully, maybe, catch a decent picture that I wasn't actually watching what the butterfly was doing.  And, I'm paying attention to the difference between the two var. of CA buckwheat found at Pinnacles.  The one shown above could potentially be polifolium, the fuzzier one.

With Paul Johnson's encouragement, this is the butterfly that has changed my mind about collecting for research.  I wanted to make sure any collecting I do would not be merely self-indulgent.  I am not a hobbyist butterfly collector.  However, I believe collecting in this case is worth the contribution to our understanding of these fascinating little blue butterflies.  I will be applying for a collecting permit, and the specimens and associated plant data are tentatively earmarked for the Pinnacles National Park collection.

lupine blue ~ 05/06/14 ~ Pinnacles

lupine blue freshly emerged and resting on California buckwheat
Plebejus lupini freshly emerged and resting on Eriogonum fasciculatum var. polifolium
(Shapiro and BugGuide discussion)
Polygonaceae

silvery blue ~ 04/08/14 ~ Pinnacles

 silvery blue nectaring upside down

Glaucopsyche lygdamus nectaring upside down
more information

He must have the hiccups he's trying cure?  Or the violet nectar is very potent, and this is a drunk butterfly?  Take your pick.  I was entertained watching this lone blue butterfly land horizontally across the topmost petal, extend his proboscis, turn down towards the center of the flower (either clockwise or counter-clockwise), and stick his head in as far as possible for a long draught (enough for me to get numerous pictures), and then wipe his proboscis off on a petal before moving on to another violet.  Wash and repeat.  So often, butterflies are quite dainty about their sipping, gently using their feet to taste.  Not this fellow, his proboscis led the way, and he was drinking with gusto.  I was a little surprised he didn't ever topple over. 

Johnny jump up / California golden violet
Viola pedunculata
Violaceae

So, naturally, I tried to stick the flash up in there, too, to see what the fuss was all about.  The violets are by no means tall, even though the flowers do, indeed, jump up away from the leaves.  Holding the camera down there facing a 45° angle up is tricky.  I'm starting to rue the day last fall when we discovered the macro feature on our 10-year-old point-and-shoot.  I want to do everything in macro now.  Macro, macro, macro!  Mwahahaha... but, it burns the battery quickly.  The dark nectar guides are stunning.  I bet they taste sweet to little feet (and probosces).

cute butterfly butt (view from above)

As a final note, the famously extinct Xerces blue butterfly is considered by some to have been a ssp. of Glaucopsyche lygdamus.  Then, there's also the federally endangered Palos Verdes blue butterfly (G. lygdamus palosverdesensis), which is being reintroduced, as Brent @ Breathing Treatment knows first-hand.

echo blue ~ 02/10/14 ~ Stevens Creek

 echo blue / Pacific azure (formerly spring azure)

more pictures

Celastrina echo echo / Celastrina ladon echo

more information

What time of year is it, again?  Mid-February?  A fairly fresh blue butterfly?  Oh, that's right, we're in CA (sorry, folks back East, with all your snow and ice).  The Pacific azure is one of the earliest butterflies of the year here, not including those that overwinter as adults like the monarch butterfly. 

However, they're not the only ones on the wing this early.  I also spotted a couple whites (Pontia sp.) nectaring on a small patch of milkmaids during our hike.  They were possibly checkered white (P. protodice), spring white (P. sisymbrii), or even western white (P. occidentalis - see Dr. Shapiro's note).  Even if my only photograph wasn't blown-out in bright white, I have a hard time distinguishing between them.  

Speaking of photographs, the above is a vast improvement over my only other spring azure picture (it helps to learn the settings on the camera - doh!).  I'm keeping the old name on that post in reverence to my butterfly days past of true C. ladon ladon in Ohio.  I found the male above right next to the creek.  Maybe he was trying to mud-puddle and got caught in the rain?  He was pretty wet but still alive.

ps 02/21/14 - Now that I have good pictures of whites from Los Padres Dam, I'm positive what I saw were margined whites (Pieris marginalis venosa), not a blown-out bright white Pontia sp.  Doh!

pss 02/26/14 - I've changed the primary common name from Pacific azure to echo blue.  I kept getting stumped on my own post.  Haha.  Echo blue is the name I actually hear being used, and that's what I remember it as.  Online sources are trying to make Pacific azure (and echo azure) a thing when I don't know anyone who actually calls them that.  Maybe the younger lepidopterists are more hip to the new names?

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.

lustrous copper ~ 05/14/13 ~ Lang Crossing

lustrous copper

Lycaena cupreus

male lustrous copper and male greenish blue nectaring on American yellowrocket

Lycaena cupreus and male Plebejus saepiolus nectaring on Barbarea orthoceras

Brassicaceae

Dr. Shapiro sent me a list of butterflies he recorded for Lang Crossing 3 days before our excursion.  I was very disappointed to discover I wouldn't see the gorgeous lustrous copper at Washington and told Art as much.  So, late in the afternoon, parched from the extremely warm day, as the shadows filled in the primo butterfly hangouts, we faced a dilemma: go straight to the Washington Hotel for some much needed liquid refreshment and call it a day, or go 10 miles up the road for me to see my first ever Lycaena cupreus at Lang.  It was Art's wife who suggested doing both, but only after making him guarantee that I would see a copper butterfly.  That guarantee looked like it was going to be a bust, because we failed to find any coppers at the spot Dr. Shapiro saw them previously.  Fortunately, in a moist meadow across the river, we hit the coppery mother lode.  I have so many pictures of this wildly, brilliantly, bold butterfly, including the last one above where a greenish blue wanted to get in on the photo shoot action. Tired as I was, I was extremely glad we made the extra hour and a half round-trip.

Some additional notes - If I hadn't known what to look for, I could have easily brushed off the resting butterfly in the second picture as the more-familiar-to-me acmon blue, with only the underside of the hindwings showing.  It's easy to distinguish when they're flashing their brilliant copper tops or are still in a photograph, but from a distance and hiding in real life, it's not so easy.

There's some question how the lustrous copper larvae feed primarily on the moderately invasive sheep sorrel.  With all the recent heavy bashing of non-native plants [I'm a believer in if it's alive, then why kill it?  Unless it's doing great harm to others, our ever-changing opinions should not be the sole reason for death, which extends to humans and wars.], it's interesting to note that some native butterflies have taken to them and likely depend on them for their survival.  Or do they?  Art wonders if our local sheep sorrel (Rumex acetosella) has been incorrectly deemed an Old World species, and could be found native through genetics techniques.  Hmm?

What tripped me up throughout the day was mistaking the blue moth (Caenurgina caerulea) for one of the blue butterflies.  Now that I looked it up, it doesn't look blue at all.  Weird.  And finally, I would have had a difficult time figuring out which fuzzy blue butterfly is in the last picture, not to mention yellow mustard-looking plant, if it wasn't for Art's continuing patient guidance via e-mail. Thanks, Dr. Shapiro!

acmon blue ~ 06/10/11 ~ Pinnacles

acmon blue
Plebejus acmon
for more information click here and here

Oy! This was play the game of spot the difference between the individual shown above and the bernardino dotted blue I posted from the previous day. Here are my own (layman) explanations of why I'm leaning towards an acmon blue ID:
1) Almost every picture of bernardinos I've seen have a black spot that touches the costal margin (leading edge of the forewing) at around the 3rd row of spots down from the outer margin. It is missing here as it is with acmons.
2) The overall appearance of the spots on the forewing are rounder like with acmons, rather than squarish with bernardinos.
3) Most pictures of bernardinos I've seen have 4 spots on the hindwing between where the wing attaches to the body and the cell-end bar (dash in the middle of the wing). The 2nd spot up from the hindwing trailing margin (wing edge along the abdomen) is missing, again, like with acmons.
4) Bernardinos have flat black spots on the outer edge of the hindwing and acmons have iridescent blue spots. Either they were worn off on this older butterfly or the backlighting hides the effect such that the spots appear all black.
5) It is not obvious that this butterfly has checkered fringes on the forewing, which is common in in bernardinos. Yet, there is the possibility they were worn off of this older butterfly.
6) Speaking of worn, older butterflies, I also posted a top-side view of an acmon blue from the previous day. This tells me the flight period is almost exactly the same, whereas the bernardino blue was fresh.

Sigh, this is probably way more detail than anyone wants to read. Lepidopterists must be excruciatingly nitpicky, closely followed by botanists. Can you imagine if we applied these same miniscule differences to other living things? To humans? Well, this person has green eyes and that person has hazel eyes, so they "must" be different species. I have to laugh at myself, because what the heck am I doing with this blog? Two years ago I couldn't even tell you the difference between chinese houses and sky lupine, and now I'm counting the dots on a tiny butterfly's wing.