In late July I went to Jack Darling Memorial Park in Mississauga hoping to see a butterfly or two that I have never knowingly observed. The previous year, a report had been made around the same time of an Acadian Hairstreak and of a Broad-winged Skipper. To my excitement, I did find a new-to-me butterfly on my visit. The only problem is, I’m still not sure what kind it was!
What is This Plain Skipper with the Long Pale Streak Along the Wing?
When I first saw the mystery Skipper it was startled into flight by an aggressive Silver-spotted Skipper. As it landed, I tried to focus on it. My first impression was that it was “longer” than the Peck’s and Northern Broken-dash Skippers I see most often. As the camera focused, I noticed a pale line or streak along the length of the wings. To me, that meant I was looking at a Broad-winged Skipper, the same type reported nearby last year.
Gleefully, I took a few hundred photos. I knew the bright sunshine was glaring. So I tried various exposure corrections and f-stops.
The butterfly skipped over to other purple coneflowers every few minutes. It stubbornly, ok probably just happily, kept its wings tightly closed 99.9% of the time except when in its way-too-fast to photo short flights. I kept trying to get photos of the upper sides of the wings because it is much easier to id butterflies if you can see both the upper and undersides of the wings.
I even switched memory cards and took a dozen photos on another card, in case I lost or corrupted the first card.
Of course, I was melting as I stood in the noon day sun in ‘heat alert’ humidity. So eventually I thought it was safe to leave. There could be no doubt in my mind or anyone else’s that I had seen a Broad-winged Skipper.
Or could there?
Playing the Jigsaw Puzzle Butterfly Spot Matching Game Again
When I sorted through my photos on the big computer screen at home, doubt set in. My skipper definitely had a pale line down the side. But at some angles, it had two.
I also did have about 6 photos where the Skipper held its wings slightly open. I could see pale dots inside.
What did they best match….?
Broad-winged Skipper or Dion Skipper? Or a Very Worn Every Day Skipper?
Dion Skippers also have a pale stripe. In fact they have two pale stripes. And they have pale dots inside.
All Skippers can lose scales which leaves them with uncoloured areas. Were these really pale streaks, or just wear marks? They were on both sides which was some what encouraging.
Ack!
Both Broad-winged and Dion eat sedges. There are sedges near where I took the photos, along a small creek between Jack Darling park and private property.
Both Broad-winged and Dion had been seen in flight within the Credit River watershed within the last two weeks.
Letting the Experts Take a Look at a Mystery Butterfly
Eventually I gave up. Instinct tells me it’s a Broad-winged given one was seen here last year. Hope tells me it’s a Dion which would be a first for the location at least recently. Common sense reminds me that it might be a common skipper with some wear that I am mistaking for something else.
I posted my observation as a plain old Skipper Species on e-Butterfly.org confident an expert would soon tell me it was blindingly obvious that it was a Type B or Type D.
And they just approved it as Unknown!
Argh!
Same Time, Next Year ?
I hope that in time, someone will commit to an id. In the meantime, I know I saw SOMETHING different, even if I’m not quite sure what to call it.
And I enjoyed the opportunity to watch this Skipper going about its every day life: I know it likes Echinacea but was not very interested in Bergamot, that it is not easily intimidated into moving by pushy bees, that it takes off like a spring and folds wings almost instantly when landing, and that its progeny might come back next year to allow me another look.
If the weather permits, which I doubt, I may get back to the Prairie Demonstration Garden to try for another look. [Update: I did. No sign of it.] But my Skipper was already showing wear so even a few days from now, it and its kin may be gone. And there is never any guarantee that a nectaring skipper will be at the same spot later: Unlike where it wants to lay its eggs, nectaring spots are not a high priority for most butterflies.
On the bright side, the Skipper knows exactly what kind it is and will no doubt hunt for a partner and try to produce more Skippers. So it doesn’t really matter what name I place on it, this butterfly already knows what it plans to do.
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