INVERTEBRATE ALERT
This blog provides an informal forum for terrestrial invertebrate watchers to post recent sightings of interesting observations in the southern Vancouver Island region. Please send your sightings by email to Jeremy Tatum (tatumjb352@gmail.com). Be sure to include your name, phone number, the species name (common or scientific) of the invertebrate you saw, location, date, and number of individuals. If you have a photograph you are willing to share, please send it along. Click on the title above for an index of past sightings.The index is updated most days.

June 21

2017 June 21

 

   Aziza Cooper sends photographs of an Essex Skipper from Panama Flats, and a worn but still recognizable Cedar Hairstreak and an Eight-spotted Skimmer from Goldstream, June 21.  Also present there, she writes, were 3 Pale Tiger and 2 Western Tiger Swallowtails, and a Lorquin’s Admiral.   It’s good to see the underside of the antennae of an Essex Skipper.  The undersides of the antennae of an Essex Skipper are black, as in Aziza’s photograph.  They are yellow in the otherwise similar Small Skipper, which has not yet been recorded in North America.  But if the Essex can make it here, why not also the Small?

 

Essex Skipper Thymelicus lineola (Lep.: Hesperiidae) Aziza Cooper

 

 

Cedar Hairstreak Mitoura rosneri (Lep.: Lycaenidae)  Aziza Cooper

 

Eight-spotted Skimmer Libellula forensis (Odo.: Libellulidae) Aziza Cooper

 

 

June 20

2017 June 20

Welcome to Summer

 

[Actually the solstice was at 9:24 pm PDT last night – but today is the first full day of summer.]

 

Cheryl Hoyle sends a photograph of a grasshopper.  Grasshoppers are usually most evident later on in the year; this one is a young nymph (see its underdeveloped wings) and is not readily identifiable.  With that proviso in mind, Claudia Copley’s best guess is maybe a species of Melanoplus

 

Young grasshopper (Orth.: Acrididae)  Cheryl Hoyle

 

Aziza Cooper writes: Today, June 20, there were 10 Field Crescents at Eddy’s Self Storage and the field north of the restaurant at the corner of West Saanich and Stelly’s Cross Road. I took pictures of seven, and was interested to see some with the wide orange band on the submarginal band of the hind-wing.

 

Jeremy Tatum writes:  I believe these are all females, with the possible exception of the one on the left in the third photograph, which may be a male suitor, though we can’t see the wing pattern well enough to be sure.

 

Field Crescent Phyciodes pratensis (Lep.:Nymphalidae)  Aziza Cooper

Field Crescent Phyciodes pratensis (Lep.:Nymphalidae)  Aziza Cooper

Field Crescents Phyciodes pratensis (Lep.:Nymphalidae)  Aziza Cooper

 

Aziza also photographed the long-horned beetle Cosmosalia chrysocoma  (“golden hair”) at the same location.

 

Cosmosalia chrysocoma (Col.: Cerambycidae)  Aziza Cooper

 

June 19

2017 June 19

 

   Kirsten Mills sends a photograph of a pair of chequered beetles in copula from Clawthorpe Park, near Hillside Mall on June 19.  Thanks to Charlene Wood and Scott Gilmore for the identification.

 

Enoclerus eximius (Col.: Cleridae)  Kirsten Mills

Orthosia hibisci (Lep.: Noctuidae)  Jeremy Tatum

Orthosia hibisci (Lep.: Noctuidae)  Jeremy Tatum

 

Val George writes:  This Satin Moth, Leucoma salicis, was at Blenkinsop Lake today, June 20.

 

The elaborate bipectinate antennae show that it is a male.

 

White Satin Moth Leucoma salicis  (Lep.: Erebidae – Lymantriinae)  Val George

 

June 18

2017 June 18

 

   Jeremy Tatum writes:  Here is a caterpillar of Egira curialis from the garden of my Saanich apartment.  It was feeding on the flowers of Welsh Poppy Meconopsis cambrica.

 

 Egira curialis (Lep.: Noctuidae) Jeremy Tatum

Egira curialis (Lep.: Noctuidae) Jeremy Tatum

 

June 17 morning

From Gordon Hart

Hello Butterfly Counters,

The June count starts today, Saturday June 17, for the period ending Sunday June 25. You can submit a count anytime over this period, and you can do more than one count, just use a separate form for each count. In the case of repeat counts, or more than one person counting an area, I will take the highest count for each species.
Please use the form at https://www.vicnhs.bc.ca/?p=33 on the Victoria Natural History Society website .
The count area is the same as the Christmas Bird Count circle (attached). For butterfly identification there are numerous internet sites, but most or all Victoria species are listed on E-Fauna. If you select by photographer, all the photos under James Miskelly’s name are of Victoria species. Here is the link: http://linnet.geog.ubc.ca/efauna/photoGallery/Gallery.aspx?gr=showall&pid=175&photographer=miskelly,%20james&specrep=0
If you would like a suggestion for an area to count, please send me an email.

In addition to the counts, a monthly butterfly walk is held on the first Sunday of each month – the next walk will be on July 2. We start at the summit of Mount Tolmie at 1pm, and decide where to go from there. I will send out another reminder the week before. 

Thank-you for submitting your sightings and happy counting!

Gordon Hart
Butterfly Count Coordinator
Victoria Natural History Society
Count circle map link: