>http://www.oldhippy.org/Butterfly.jpg Nice picture! It's a Lorquin's Admiral, one of the few butterflies that I can recognize. I'm not surprised you couldn't recognize it from the web site, since they only show a picture of the underside of the wings, which look quite different. <http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/distr/lepid/bflyusa/or/26.htm> You can tell male/female by behavior. If it ignores you, it's a girl; if it hangs out on a high point and attacks you, it's a boy :-) A couple of years ago I had a male take up a perch at the top of my mock orange, and for nearly three days, he attacked everything that moved. Me, the dog, starlings flying by, bees...a very busy fellow. I'll never know if he disappeared because he gave up on the location, or if he finally attacked something that ate him! I've had a couple of females wander through, but, there've been no little ones yet. Maybe because I don't have any plants from the poplar or willow families, though I've seen prunus listed a host too and I have a bitter cherry. (Come to think of it, I bet those kids get pretty darned big before they pupate.) -- Allyn Weaks allyn@tardigrade.net Seattle, USDA zone 7-8 Pacific Northwest Native Wildlife Gardening: http://www.tardigrade.org/natives/ "MacCarthy didn't go nearly far enough." -- Shrub
For more information about pnw-natives, or to manage your subscription, please see the list instructions.