Date: 05/26/2015

Number: 1

5/26/15 Greensboro (NC) Arboretum Butterflies

I saw my first Monarch of the year yesterday. I spent two hours in the Greensboro (Guilford County, NC) Arboretum on Tuesday, May 26th, from 1:30 to 3:30. I checked the designated Butterfly Garden and the Perennial Garden, neither of which had any butterflies even though there are many nectar sources in bloom right now. I did see a few along the unmowed creek edge, the location of the Monarch.

There is a lot of Common Milkweed along the creek. The Monarch was cruising around the various patches, but only landed briefly once. It flew very close to me several times and I wasn’t able to see pheromone patches. Also the veins seemed rather wide. Consequently, I suspect it was a female, but it didn’t appear to be ovipositing.

The only other butterflies I saw were 6 Cabbage Whites, 1 Sleepy Orange, 5 “summer” azures, 1 Common Buckeye (nectaring on white clover), and 3 Silver-spotted Skippers. My totals for the day were 17 butterflies of 6 species.

Courtesy of Carolina Leps

Greensboro, NC

Latitude: 36.1 Longitude: -79.8

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