ZEBRA SWALLOWTAIL (stray) in CT on Saturday

[Grkovich, Alex]

CT leppers...

I don't know if you folks know what went on after you left Jared Eliot Preserve on Saturday, but note the report below by (my friend) Matt Arey to NE leps...

Matt found a worn (stray) female ZEBRA SWALLOWTAIL at the Preserve...along with a Giant Swallowtail and some other good things...Apparently with a huge flight of the larger darker summer form (lecontei) of the Zebra in the middle Atlantic States, and this encounter with the species by Matt in S CT, we should be keeping our eyes open for more strays of this species along the Coast and along the southern parts of the major river valleys...(as Harry called it a few weeks ago)...

Report by Matt follows below...

Alex
________________________________
From: Alex Grkovich [agrkovich2003 at yahoo.com]
Sent: Sunday, August 21, 2011 4:59 PM
To: Grkovich, Alex
Subject: Fw: [NEleps] Guilford, New Haven Co. CT (Jared Eliot Preserve & Chaffinch Is. Park) 8/20/11



----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Matthew <mothman617 at yahoo.com>
To: NEleps at yahoogroups.com
Sent: Saturday, August 20, 2011 9:18 PM
Subject: [NEleps] Guilford, New Haven Co. CT (Jared Eliot Preserve & Chaffinch Is. Park) 8/20/11


Guilford, New Haven Co. CT (Jared Eliot Preserve & Chaffinch Is. Park) 8/20/11 `a real taste of the South.'

Weather conditions: sunny, hot 85-90 deg.F

Jared Eliot Preserve - Guilford, CT

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Pterourus glaucus) 6 or 7
Spicebush Swallowtail (Pterourus troilus) 10+ common
Eastern Black Swallowtail (Papilio polyxenes asterius) 2, males

** Giant Swallowtail (Heraclides cresphontes) 1 male, some flight wear
** ZEBRA SWALLOWTAIL (Eurytides marcellus) 1 worn - stray (female)

** Hackberry Emperor (Asterocampa celtis) 15-20, mostly worn males (some very worn and tattered), only a few in fresh condition. A couple of fresh females.
** Tawny Emperor (Asterocampa clyton) 2 fresh looking males

Snout Butterfly (Libythea carinenta bachmanii) 5 or 6, most worn

Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) 1
Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) 1
Buckeye (Junonia coenia) 5+
Question Mark (Polygonia interrogationis) 2 or 3, fresh looking (summer form)
Red Spotted Purple (Limenitis arthemis astayanax) 2
Variegated Fritillary (Euptoieta claudia) 1
Monarch (Danaus plexippus) 20 + common

** Red Banded Hairstreak (Calycopis cecrops) 2, some wear
Gray Hairstreak (Strymon melinus) 3
Summer Azure (Celastrina neglecta) 10+
Eastern Tailed Blue (Everes comyntas) 5+

Zabulon Skipper (Poanes zabulon) 15+, common
Broad Winged Skipper (Poanes viator) 25+, abundant, most fresh
Fiery Skipper (Hylephila phyleus) 2, fresh
Sachem (Atalopedes campestris) 1, fresh
Silver Spotted Skipper (Epargyreus clarus) 15+, common, fresh
Peck's Skipper (Polites peckius) 5+
Least Skipper (Ancyloxypha numitor) 5+, fresh

** Checkered White (Pontia protodice) 1 individual observed by a CT Leps member
Cloudless Sulphur (Phoebis sennae) 1 flying high and fast over the adjacent marshes (they're coming...).

Other whites & sulphurs - several

Chaffinch Is. Park - Guilford, CT

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Pterourus glaucus) 4 or 5
Spicebush Swallowtail (Pterourus troilus) 3

** Hackberry Emperor (Asterocampa celtis) only 3 or 4 around just two select Hackberry Trees
** Tawny Emperor (Asterocampa clyton) 1
Snout Butterfly (Libythea carinenta bachmanii) 2 or 3, worn

Monarch (Danaus plexippus) a few around
Buckeye (Junonia coenia) 2

* Jared Eliot Preserve: Things really got active in the early to mid afternoon. Each Hackberry Tree featured between 5 and 6 male A. celtis jousting and chasing one another. Most perched high up and out of close observation. A few females were also observed ovipositing. I also ran into some of the CT Leps people there who were departing the site at about noontime.

* Zebra Swallowtail: (Harry, you were right - but I was least expecting it). Certainly a wayward southern stray. Worn but not too ragged looking. One tail missing, the other tail half missing. I believe Connecticut has previous records of this species turning up on occasion. Nectaring upon a type of tall early blooming aster (deep purple) that are a primary nectar source in the open damp meadow right now. The Giant Swt., other Papilio and all sorts of Hesperidae were all over this stuff.

* Chaffinch Is. Park: Not too much activity in spite of the many more Hackberry Trees.

M. Arey

________________________________
From: owner-ctleps-l at lists.yale.edu [mailto:owner-ctleps-l at lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Jamie Meyers
Sent: Sunday, August 21, 2011 10:49 PM
To: CTLEPS-L at lists.yale.edu
Subject: Second hand Giant, interesting Red-banded Hairstreak tidbit

Folks, my birding friend Mona Cavallero had a Giant Swallowtail in her yard in West Hartford today.  I'm mentioning that here since I have not seen many reports from Hartford County.  She sent me nice photos of it.

I read the Guilford walk trip report from yesterday with great interest.  The Mass Butterfly Club did a walk for emperors in the very southern part of the Pioneer Valley yesterday, which I attended.  They had a Red-banded Hairstreak at excellent Fannie Stebbins refuge in Longmeadow, literally a mile or two north of the CT border along the CT river.  Someone told me that was a second state record for it, the first having come very recently this year.  I found that interesting, given the number of reports from CT over the past couple of years.

Lenny's trip list from Guilford was outstanding and I would have loved to have made that trip but I didn't have time to make the trek.

Jamie Meyers
Canton, CT
________________________________
CAUTION PLEASE NOTE: The information contained in this transmission is intended to be sent only to the stated recipient of the transmission.
If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient or the intended
recipient's agent, you are hereby notified that we do not intend to waive
any privilege that might ordinarily be attached to this communication. Any
dissemination, distribution or copying of the information contained in this
transmission is therefore prohibited. You are further asked to notify us of
any such error in transmission as soon as possible at the telephone
number/email address shown above. Thank you for your cooperation.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.yale.edu/mailman/private/ctleps-l/attachments/20110822/eeb4325d/attachment.html