The next day after photographing them the gardeners cut them down with their weed eaters! 🙂 And NOTE for those receiving this as an email: All blog posts received in an email are BEST SEEN AND READ ONLINEby clicking the title above. Some design features are not carried over to the email version.
The first photo is a yellow & white daisy-like tiny flower that does attract the tiny butterflies and the second is some kind of whitish puff ball with a separate flower bud in front of it. The bud is probably of the same species as the yellow & white flower pictured, since it was close by. Even weeds have a beauty that can be photographed and several of my butterfly photos include such “weed flowers” never mentioned! 🙂
“Weed Flower,” Atenas, Costa RicaWeed flower bud in front of a “puff ball” of another weed, Atenas, Costa Rica
Because I no longer print my images to sell through a galeria or seasonal shows here, I will make it a little easier for you to order Wall Art or other art image by narrowing down the possibilities some. Every image in every gallery is available but this new gallery includes both the images I’ve sold before and some I think would possibly make good art! And remember that in the buying process menu you can crop the images more or differently than I have.
SmugMug (my gallery host) uses the very best printers for each type of art and I recommend for wall art high gloss metal prints to stand out or for a softer look, try photos printed on canvas (and I prefer the wrap-around canvas). They have many other items you can print any of my photos on from greeting cards to coffee mugs, etc. Have fun exploring! Just click the shopping bag pix on any photo or the BUY PHOTO button on an enlarged photo and follow the menu! Easy! 🙂
And for COSTA RICA CUSTOMERS, you will need a shipping service that provides you a U.S. address like Atenas Webshop or Costa Rica Shipping with both getting the package to Atenas and if picking up in Alajuela is no problem, Aeropostis a little faster because they have their own daily planes. All three of these give you a Miami Address to use on your orders.
Now it is not me writing, but it tells a lot about life for one expat from the states living here, and of course not everything applies to me! I do not have a car, I don’t drink alcohol, and though I like beans and rice I don’t eat them every morning for breakfast! 🙂 But it is still an interesting article supposedly about the life of one North American expat living here and the relaxed culture that many Americans adopt here! And one thing that is like him, I too live in T-shirt and shorts all day every day! 🙂
It’s fun to “REDISCOVER” what you already have! A new collection of photo galleries has been created in my big main gallery, to display butterfly photos I made in other countries before moving to Costa Rica, especially during my last 10 years in the USA, where I found that I had old photos for 64 species! Not as many in other countries visited, particularly since I was not focused on butterflies back then! 🙂 There is a main “folder” Gallery for “other countries” with country galleries in that or in the case of the U.S., another folder with Taxonomy Family folders for a lot more butterflies! These new galleries are organized as follows . . .
When I first studied these photos of another brown Skipper in my garden I focused on those distinctive 3 white dots located near the apex of the forward wing on both top and bottom sides. That led me first to the “Three-spotted Skipper” (Cymaenes tripunctus) which seemed logical, but it has more spots on the under side, thus not a real match. Next with 3 spots was the Cobalopsis Nero which I’ve seen before, but he too had additional spots that my photos did not show and it seemed another unidentified Skipper might be the case . . .
. . . until I checked my own butterfly gallery and there it was! Guerrero Sootywing, Bolla guerra! I’ve seen it two other times, once at the nearby Reserva Madre Verde in Palmares and on the Caribbean Coast at Hotel Banana Azul. Sooo . . . another mystery solved! And believe me! They are not all this easy – nor do I always even achieve an identification. But this one turned out nicely and here are the 3 photos used in that circuitous search . . . 🙂
Another beautiful butterfly in my garden that I have only occasionally is the Mexican Yellow, Eurema mexicana. Here’s 3 slightly different shots of this soft, simple and pastel butterfly . . .
To be so windy and the lesser time of year for butterflies, I keep being amazed at the number of new butterflies I find in my garden, mostly the tiny ones. Depending on my source of information, this one has two common names, Halcyon Hairstreak or the one I have to use: Halciones Hairstreak with all sources using the same scientific name of Ostrinotes halciones. All Hairstreaks have that wiry tail to make predators think it is the head.
This species is found in both Central and South America from Mexico to Brazil, but my photo will be the first on butterflies and moths dot org, if they add the species that I’ve requested. I have about 5 requests waiting to be approved like that. The huge number of species of everything in Costa Rica continues to amaze me! It is one of the most diverse locations on the planet! The exact middle location between North & South America. I’m posting 4 photos of this new-to-me species . . .
There are not many flowers more different from each other than this Heliconia and the Desert Rose in my garden that I snapped the other day while looking for butterflies. The Heliconia is so typical of Costa Rica, found from coast to coast, mainly in tropical lowlands but also other places. While the Desert Rose is a specialty pot plant rather atypical of Costa Rica that I got from my old friend and neighbor Anthony, years ago when he returned to the states. Since he has now died, it is sort of a living memorial to him. It’s rather delicate, requiring morning sun only and not too much water to keep blooming. It’s a faithful favorite for me!
Though this one does not have the violet color as my other sighting of this species did, I believe this is the correct ID and most of the others posted online do not have the violet color. Violet-frosted Skipper, Mnasicles geta, link to my gallery on this one. And like many others I’ve found here, I think that there should probably be multiple subspecies of this one with different colorations.
Violet-frosted Skipper, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
Instead of such an obvious “Common Name” (above) the source website names that I have to use for BAMONA, which doesn’t already have this butterfly in their database yet, is whatever BOA (butterfliesofamerica) has in their listing and their “common name” is Augustinula Hairstreak with the scientific name of Denivia augustinula. So that is the ID you will find in my personal gallery (which I try to keep in sync with butterfliesandmoths). In my gallery I have more photos from this past Sunday morning’s new discovery for me at Augustinula Hairstreak Gallery where there is an interesting rear shot with a long shadow of the insect. 🙂
For the serious student of butterflies, the Glassberg book uses the common name of “Blue-spotted Greatstreak” and another scientific name used online: Theritas augustinula. Plus, for what it is worth, I found a 3rd scientific name being used online of Thecla augustinula. :-) You can see why identification sometimes drives me crazy! 🙂 Just one photo here and you can go to my gallery for more.
“Blue-spotted” or Augustinula Hairstreak, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
That is . . . a new species for me to photograph! There are so many species of butterflies in Costa Rica, about 1500, that my butterfly gallery of 260 species barely shows the huge variety here! This tiny butterfly landed on an equally tiny wildflower for just a few seconds and was gone! Because he is one of the “Blues,” the top side of his wings will be some shade of blue, but I did not get to see or photograph that and he was even partly hidden behind a portion of the flower. Maybe I’ll see this one again soon.
He has been seen spottily across the U.S., though mainly in Florida and Texas and on south through Central America. See the location map on ButterfliesAndMoths. Here’s two shots I got in my garden.
