Tosohatchee WMA, 4/12/2017 (Part 2)

Swarthy Skipper

About a week ago I shared the fun experience I had with Jeff Cagle at Tosohatchee WMA. We found about 30 butterflies, and more than half of them were new to me. Especially the skippers. I'm finding out that skippers can be extraordinarily difficult to identify. Some of them are like the empids of the butterfly world. Perhaps I'll feel differently once I get to know them more, but right now, that's how I feel.

Twin-spot Skipper

But skippers are kind of fun as well, and their small size makes them somewhat of a challenge to photograph. But often they don't mind me getting close to them if I move slowly enough, and that left me with some half-way decent photos of these guys. And that makes for some exciting time.

Horace's Duskywing Skipper

Confused Cloudywing

With my colorblind eyes, I think of these skippers in groups of "orange" and "brown." The orange ones can be really hard to tell apart from each other, and the brown ones can be equally hard to tell apart. But with Jeff's help (and the expertise of the good people at the Florida Butterflies Facebook group), I think I have the ones we photographed figured out. Soon more will start flying and I'll be back to square one. All these species were new to me except for the duskywing and the whirlabout.