4th of July Butterfly Counts

Finally a sunny weekend and just in time for the NABA 4th of July Butterfly Counts. I had the pleasure of attending 2 counts this weekend. The first North Worcester County Count was organized by Carl Kamp and the Wachusett Meadows gang with a Great after count BBQ by the Walker Family. This was a nice day for my wife Shelley and I to spend some quality time away from the garden chores bouncing around some interesting habitats and having fun... The second was the Eastern Franklin County count organized by Mark Fairbrother centered around Turners falls. I had the pleasure of the Company of my new friend Eric Eaton who is here for a few months from Tuscon.

Both counts were a lot of fun and a great chance to hang out with friends from both east and west of our Athol home base. Butterfly diversity and number of individuals on both counts were low. This perhaps due to the recent monsoons frustrating entomology buffs for weeks... But as always a day in the field brings interesting sightings and experiences. Sunday Eric and I found this interesting coupling of a Little Glassywing with a European Skipper... Will we return next year to this field to find European Glassywings?

There were many highlights for the day including a Spadderdock Darner Aeschna muttata which we stumbled upon as we exited a particularly rich patch of overgrown field near the Connecticut River in Northfield. Eric and I exchanged our enthusiasm and knowledge of the various insects we came across making for a fun and interesting day... Between us the insects didn't have a chance to escape our constantly clicking cameras.

I hope the folks conducting other counts over the weekend and the big Waldon Pond Bioblitz had as much fun as we did enjoying the first sunny weekend in a long time and our beloved invertebrates...