Subject:  Great Basin Wood Nymph and Tarantula Hawk sighting
Geographic location of the bug: Westridge-Canyonback Wilderness Park, California
Date: 07/03/2021
Time: 9:42 AM PDT
Your letter to the bugman:  Dear Readers,
Daniel was excited to try out a new hydration pack on his hike with Sharon today, and while near the lowest part of the hike, just above Mandeville Canyon, he spotted a small lepidopteran, suspected a Funereal Duskywing and was pleasantly surprised to quickly discover it was a Satyr or Nymph, but when it landed, it vanished, avoiding Daniel’s perception despite him knowing the exact 4 square inch plot of ground it had landed on before vanishing perfectly camouflaged among the fallen leaves.  After about a minute and a half, Daniel espied it and got this image of what he believes to be a Great Basin Wood Nymph, which is pictured on both the Natural History of Orange County and BugGuide.

Great Basin Wood Nymph

According to BugGuide:  “Above, wings are brown. Below, female has two large eyespots on the forewing, male has two smaller ones”  indicating this is a female.  After Daniel got this image and a few more from further distances, he decided he had snuck up close enough to have to startled the butterfly into flight, and once he verified the image was of acceptable quality, he moved in for a closer shot, but could no longer spot the elusive Nymph who had changed her position slightly enough to once again avoid Daniel’s detection.

Earlier in the morning, Daniel is positive he saw an all black Tarantula Hawk near the blooming narrow leaf milkweed that was likely either Pepsis grossa or Pepsis mexicana.  It seemed pretty huge to, so we are guessing the former based on Eric Eaton’s comments on this prior posting. 

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Subject:  Spreading Wings on a Warm Spring Day
Geographic location of the bug:  Mulholland Gate, California
Date: 04/24/2021
Time: 10:40 PM EDT
Your letter to the bugman :  Dear Bugman,
While hiking in the Santa Monica mountains, I spotted this winged beauty. April 24, 2021
I also spotted two other winged creatures on flowers, there were several in the area and strangely didn’t seem to be alive.
How you want your letter signed :  Melanie on the Irish Chain

Chalcedon Checkerspot

Dear Melanie,
We immediately recognized your lovely butterfly as one of the Checker-Spots and turning to Charles Hogue’s Insects of the Los Angeles Basin, we identified your individual as a Chalcedon Checker-Spot, Euphydryas chaldecona, and Hogue specifies:  “Though rarely seen in the basin’s flatlands, this species may be quite abundant in the surrounding foothills, visiting flowers in the spring and early summer” and later of the preferred caterpillar food plants “locally they are particularly fond of Sticky Monkey Flower (Diplacus longiflorus), a common native shrub of the coastal sage plant community.”  It is pictured on Butterflies and Moths of North America and on BugGuide and well as here on BugGuide where it it is recognized as a subspecies, Euphydryas chalcedona chalcedona, and where it states on the BugGuide info page that the range is:  “Primarily relatively near the Pacific Coast, west of desert areas, in areas of broken terrain, from northern British Columbia to northern Baja California Norte. Inland in mountains of eastern Oregon and Washington, across northern Idaho and just into extreme western Montana. Also inland in desert mountains across the Mojave and Sonoran Deserts of southern California and Nevada into southern Arizona and perhaps northwestern Sonora.”  It may have appeared “not alive” because it was seen earlier in the day and it had not yet warmed enough so that it might fly.  We cannot conclusinvely identify your images of the Solitary Bee and Wasp.

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Subject:  Butterfly ID please
Geographic location of the bug:  Iguazu Fall, Nissiones province, Argentina
Date: 04/14/2021
Time: 10:45 PM EDT
Your letter to the bugman:  Could you ID this butterfly please. Photo taken on Feb.28. 2020 at Iguazu Falls, Argentina
How you want your letter signed:  Vlad Morozov

Small Eyed Sailor

Dear Vlad,
This pretty little butterfly is Dynamine artemisia, commonly called a Small Eyed Sailor, and we found it on the Fauna Paraguay site where it states:  “Like all Dynamine this species is most easily identified by its underwing pattern which show the “sideways spectacles” of most other “blue sailors” but diagnostically lack the obvious “eyespots” present in other species. It is closest to Dynamine aerata and males are only reliably distinguished by the presence of clear dark eyespots in the “sideways spectacles”. Dynamine postverta has the most marked “eyespots” of all on the ventral hindwing, whilst males are easily distinguished by the presence of large black spots on the forewing. Female postverta has numerous large white spots on the forewing (5 in this species) and three thin white bands across the hindwing (two broad bands in this species). Dynamine tithiais the most distinctive of the “blue sailors” having an underwing pattern that is mostly white and more reminiscent of the “white sailors”. Males of that species are a much deeper blue in colour and have a diagonal row of three large whitish postmedial spots and two small white apical spots surrounded by black on the forewing.”  Here is another image from FlickR.

Thank you very much Daniel.
The whole week I was digging net for results without success

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