First Lep Sighting of the Year!!!

[mbpi at juno.com]

Forgive my excitement, but I was fortuitous enough to see my first
harbinger of Spring here in the Chicago metropolis...and it wasn't a
Turdus migratorius...

Today was sunny though nippy, but something told me it would be a good
day to see a Ourningmae loakcae, if nothing else.  (Does "Pig Latin"
count as Latin?!)  Okay, okay, I can almost "see" the less-than-amused
looks at my adolescent attempt at levity, so I will refrain from further
fun-poking....

I decided to take a walk through a woodlot near my home, and was rather
crestfallen to see it had been considerably "thinned," and looking about
as grey, dead and dismal as unexpectedly possible on the first of April. 
Not a hint of "spring" anywhere: not even a sprout of green or a leaf
bud.  But I dutifully trudged on, knowing that this particular woodlot
had graced me with a number of butterfly sightings in past perandials. 
After walking along the trail and then returning the same route without
observing even an avian species, I was ready to give up, and so cut a
path through the severed understory.  Lo and behold, there on a stump,
sunbathing in all its overwinter glory (and none the worse for wear), was
a Polygonia comma!  It was so bright and beautiful, compared to its drab
surroundings, that I wanted to yell for someone to "come here and see
this!"  Unfortunately (or fortunately, considering the questionable
neighborhood I was in), there was no one else around.  I have to admit: 
it made my day.  (It was my first sighting of a Comma that got me started
in butterflies.)

Now...if I can just find those elusive Incisalia polios that are
"rumored" to be in the bearberry at Illinois Beach State Park...

Mary Beth Prondzinski
Evanston, Illinois
USA
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