Welcome back, misssherry! ;-) I love your pic of the Variegated Fritillary! Even the snake picture is pretty! I'm not a snake enthusiast, but I don't kill them either. I know they're here for a reason, but I want them to keep plenty of distance between them and me. lol My daughter will pick up a snake (not a Copperhead!), but I can't bring myself to do that.

I'm hoping that late cats being around means that there will be a very LONG fall and a very SHORT winter. Winter and I don't get along very well. I've been finding Common Buckeye cats on my snapdragons. Just when I think I won't find anymore, I find another one. I know I'm up to over a dozen. Other years I'd be lucky to even see one buckeye let alone the dozens that I saw here this year, and boy, do they ever go for the Verbena bonariensis! That's without a doubt their favorite plant to nectar on, at least of the plants that I have. I can hardly wait to see the buckeyes eclose (half have pupated by now). I hope they don't poke around too much because it is about the middle of October already. These are the first buckeye cats that I've ever gotten here, and I'm really excited to raise them.

Cathy

Sherrywhatshername,

Always really enjoy your pictures. I often live vicariously through them since I don't get out anymore.

You're right, copperhead venom is pretty mild and injected in small doses, so their bites are almost always not serious with many bites needing no trestment at all other than washing to prevent infection. Very few people die from them even though they account for as many as or more bites per year than any of the other poisinous species in this country. Even so a bite would not be pleasant, so leave the handling to us "old snake charmers". ;) Your biggest danger was probably getting hit by a car. Know that one from jumping out to move desert tortoise off the roads many times when I lived in SG so they wouldn't get ran over, and was almost nailed a couple of times by speeding cars (as in 50-70MPH). They wouldn't slow down even for me, so the DT's sure wouldn't have had much chance on those twisty highways. DT's are highly protected in UT with a very stiff fine for even touching them, but I got away with picking them up to move because I did the annual DT counts and the Gila Monster and rattlesnake roundups for the Ad Dept every year.

These are the ones I don't handle anymore than I have to. They came into my yard often at the ranch house, so going out at night in my bare feet I had to keep an eye out. Northern Mojave Greens (Crotalus scutulatus scutulatus) are fairly large, the most aggressive rattlesnake species with the most toxic Type A venom of any snake in the US, and they inject very large doses. "Green" is misleading as they can be from very light tan to mustard yellow to emerald green and yellow to dark green to either black or dark gray with little pasttern. But there is no mistaking their aggression.

{{gwi:547928}}

Larry

Oh, my! That snake looks frightening, Larry! The rattlesnakes we have here really are green, and black and white, that is, so I figure that means they have to be eastern diamondbacks? Timber rattlers aren't listed as ever being green. I've seen them with a body as big as my arm, so they can get big. People around here talk about the number of rattles and buttons, whatever the buttons are.
Drivers go too fast on these country roads, I guess because they're usually so empty. This snake was in a big bend in the road, so people wouldn't be able to see me until it was probably too late. I've been told not to go near this creek, because there were "moccasins" in the area, and I thought they meant cotton mouths, but now I'm thinking they meant copperheads or maybe both? I can't resist stopping and looking at the different, swamp-type plants that grow there, though, at least when they're in bloom.

Cathy, buckeye cats are everywhere! The agalinis/false foxglove is in bloom all over the roadsides, and you can find the cats all over them, also the adults bopping by. I'm going to look up buckeye migration. Every fall we get hordes of them, but only a few here and there at other times of the year, so I'm thinking there is some sort of migration, or maybe they're spillovers from south of here? I'm so glad you found one - they're a beautiful caterpillar. My last batch have just about all pupated, so I should be releasing them pretty soon. I brought the variegated frit in to finish raising, couldn't resist!

Sherry

Sherry,

I answered your questions with all the why's and what for's plus a whole bunch of other information that would be very helpful to the folks here... but this POS forum software dumped it when I did the preview to submit, and made me sign in again twice to even post this. I'm not going to type it all again, sorry girl.

I have always hated GW's forum software, the PITA pop ups and no worthwhile admin help. I'd been thinking it was about time to take a long or permanent break from GW anyway.

Larry

Cathy, Verbena bonariensis seems to be a common thread linking North and South, East to West, Buckeye nectar preferences. Many other butterflies choose differing favorites coast to coast, but it appears the Buckeyes' favorite remains static. With so many disparate larval host plants preferred by the Buckeye, the counterbalance appears to lie in its universal preference to nectar on V. bonariensis. Odd, don't you think? In fact, I find V. bonariensis listed by many sources as a LFP, but I'm not sure they really use that, certainly don't "prefer" it, and possibly it is suspected as a LFP simply because they are almost always found on and around it.

Planting it next to or close to a known LFP would certainly be a huge draw.

Just my 2 cents.

Susan

I agree with you about the forum, Larry. I still can't log onto the Insects Forum, which is why I changed to MissButterfly recently. And there isn't anybody monitoring it, so if you have a problem, too bad! There is another butterfly forum that I occasionally post on - I'm one of the moderators - but it gets almost zero traffic, so you'll be talking to yourself.
Just give the forum a rest and post again very soon. It's aggravating, but it's free.
Sherry

Susan, I wasn't sure if the buckeyes preferred the V. bonariensis everywhere or not, but you probably read here more than I do. I'm sure I miss a lot of people's comments. I can definitely say that they prefer it here over any other nectar plants that I have. I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw all of those buckeye butterflies this year after years of either not seeing them at all or only seeing one briefly and then it was gone. I think last year was the first time that I actually got a picture of one. I tried to take a video of them this year with my digital camera, but they move too fast and the quality wasn't good at all, so I deleted it.

This is the third (or is it the fourth?) day that it's been raining here. We don't need it at all, and I wish we could send it down to you and people in Texas and other places that need it. PA had a lot of flooding a few weeks ago and thank goodness for sump pumps or there'd have probably been water up to the ceiling of the basement of this old house then. Because of all this rain and the cooler temps, I think I've seen the last of the butterflies for this year. I was still seeing some up until this rain started, but after it ends the temps will be way down from what they were when the butterflies were flitting about here less than a week ago.

Oh, my snapdragons aren't real close to the V. bonariensis but not real far away either. I'd say it's about 20 feet from them to the start of the verbenas. I say "start" because when you have them, you don't just have one or ten; you have a plethora of them! lol I don't think I ever have to worry about running out of that plant! I wouldn't be without it though...so many butterflies love to nectar on them. When they get out of hand and start galloping into other areas, I have to corral them back into their own "stall". :)
Cathy

Sherry,
I hear you, you do get what you pay for here. But then most forums are free, use better software and have qualified help available on short notice if someone needs it. Not to worry at the moment, I was ticked off last night, and with the season quickly winding down the forum will die on its own soon enough anyway. I too have been on many other forums that included leps (and are free), but for various reasons they where soon rejected. If push comes to shove I can always find plenty else to do that has nothing to do with leps.

Susan,
Interesting hypothesis, except that Verbena bonariensis is not naturalized in all of J. coenia's range in NA, mostly only in the SE, NE and extreme west. So there are vast areas where they couldn't prefer them as NFP's other than those they might happen on that are planted in gardens. That includes most of the states I've reared this species from over the years, so no link to that plant in those states anyway FWIW.

Larry