Great Purple Hairstreak

[Jeff Harding]

We found a great purple hairstreak - my first - feeding on choke cherry blossoms
here in Oregon, (Lake County north of Lakeview) last June.  I had a hard time
photographing it, and only got two bad shots, but identifiable.  It was at eye
level, but deep in the bush, which was on a steep slope.  Spectacular butterfly!

Jeff

Mark Walker wrote:

> Just as Anne has mentioned, the Great Purple Hairstreak feeds on mistletoe,
> and therefore spends most of it's life cycle out of view of the average
> person (at least in locations where the parasite grows up high in the
> canopy).  Interestingly, pupation occurs in the ground below the host tree,
> thus the insect can be most easily found during this stage.
>
> The range of the butterfly includes a good portion of the southern U.S.,
> Mexico, and into Latin America.  There are at least three subspecies
> recognized in the U.S., but all three are equally stunning - it is arguably
> the most extravagantly adorned North American butterfly, with metallic blue,
> gold, red, green, and black scaling.
>
> I have seen it in numbers in central Florida, but it is apparently limited
> for some reason from the southernmost counties in Florida.  I have seen the
> western race in both Arizona and California in locations where the mistletoe
> grows closer to the ground.  The adults will nectar on flowers and also
> drink from moist sand, but they don't usually stay low to the ground for
> very long.
>
> Hope this helps, and I hope you get a chance to see this piece of work some
> day.
>
> Mark Walker.
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Harriett Wright [SMTP:harriett at ix.netcom.com]
> > Sent: Saturday, December 26, 1998 8:53 PM
> > To:   leps-l at lists.yale.edu
> > Subject:      American mistletoe
> >
> > Somewhere I got the notion that American mistletoe is the larvae food
> > of a butterfly native to Florida, but I've dug through my references
> > and can't find a mention of this.  Can anyone straighten me out?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Harriett