A Warm Weekend in Washington Replete with Birds and Butterflies

       Southwest Washington was finally blessed with a few days of warm weather.   As we were on the verge of the Memorial Day Weekend, this dry weather was overdue.  Sandra and I joined our son and  grandson at the Hillsboro Airport on Saturday for the Oregon Airshow.  This was a chance to meet some of  the Navy personnel from Whidbey Island, whose roaring jets  annoy my brother on a daily basis..  

The Sound of Freedom roaring through Hillsboro.

   Of course, in the near future, these men and women may very well be protecting our very way of life.   While watching an F 35 streaking into the sky, I spotted a soaring goshawk.  And over the field adjacent to the runway there were a few barn swallows.  Suffice it say, the feathered birds were much quieter than the war
birds. 

    Sunday the weather remained warm and we headed up country to look for butterflies.  We had made internet friends with Caitlin LaBar, one of the preeminent lepidopterists in Washington and she recommended an area near my other son's home in the hills approaching Silver Star Mountain, the highest peak in southwest Washington.  Our route took us by the Larch Correctional Facility (which,  despite looking like a bucolic lodge, gave Sandra the heebie jeebies) and then into rolling hills that had suffered clear cutting sometime in the last fifteen years.  Thus, we were driving through rolling country covered with willows and and alder, with small stands of remaining conifers interspersed. We were seeing a few small white butterflies along with a few of the expected birds, Steller's Jay and flickers.  

Margined white Butterfly, Yacolt Biurn,  May 2022

    Spotting a group of butterflies on our way to Cold Creek Campground, we got out and netted one.  This was a milestone, my first use of the net we had purchased some months before.  We got one of the small insects and took some pictures through the net.  At that same stop we enjoyed a good look at a Wilson's Warbler in a willow.  Sandra tried to capture the butterfly in the net, but it escaped.  

    Using Butterflies of the Pacific Northwest by Pyle and LaBar we were able to identify this tiny fellow, with wings the size of a button on your shirt, as a Spring White.  This field guide provides a lot of information, beautiful photographs, and  for each species  a  detailed range map.   They also give you the months when a butterfly is flying, which turns out to be a significant factor for identification.  .  

    At the campground, we spotted a larger butterfly, with wings as big as a nickel.  It too fell victim to the net.  This was a bigger butterfly and while our picture is very far from perfect, it was possible for us to identify it as a Margined White.   

    This was a larger animal.  Although it looked white in flight, even through the net you see that the ventral surface had a strong yellowish green cast. 

Net, 'nocs and Naked Falls.  The Lepidopterist on the prowl.

    The park, which a week before Memorial Day was still closed for camping offered a significant change from the acres of clear cut surrounding it.  Here there are mature trees and commensurate under story vegetation in a moist depression.  This spot isn't difficult to find and may offer more species a bit later in the season.  

    That was it for butterflies on this day.  We repaired to my son's house where he and the boys were playing baseball in the yard.  As I was watching them play, I noticed a few of those small white butterflies in the salal across the street..  I grabbed the net and in short order we had captured another tiny Spring White.  I gave James a chance to grab the little devil, but he had the same result as Sandra and the butterfly escaped skyward.

   Two days later, it was still not raining.  We headed east out of Vancouver, stopping at a park on the lower Washougal where we heard Western Flycatchers calling in the cottonwoods and saw a pair of Lesser Goldfinch.  Alas, there was not a single butterfly.

Spring White Butterfly ala Vlasik

    Continuing east, we headed up Washougal River Road and in half an hour we were at Dougan Falls. As we made our way the high overcast descended.  The day was becoming darker, but the rain held off.  Just before the bridge, which spans the upper Washougal, a medium sized off white butterfly fluttered skyward.  With our new found experience we could bet that this was a Margined White. 

    Seeing nothing of interest, we cruised through the parking area and took the gravel road skirting the Washougal.  Last year, albeit a few weeks later into the season, this road had been highly prolific.  Today there was nothing.  The best we achieved was a picture of your faithful correspondent posing as a lepidopterist in front of Naked Falls.  You can thank your lucky stars that he was not posing naked in front of Naked Falls!

    The drive back to the parking area was equally disappointing.  Sandra and I made the turn and headed up the road along Dougan Creek.  Last year this road, which is right beside the rushing stream, yielded many butterflies, including a spectacular look at Lorquin's Admiral.  We got to our favorite parking spot and disembarked, immediately finding some Spring Whites.  I netted one and now our new plan was thrown into action.  

Spring White Butterfly, Dougan Creek, Wa.  May 2022

      Capturing the tiny butterflies by hand (for the purpose of photography) simply did not work for us.  The distaff part of our team had proposed that we find a glass bottle through which we might try to take some pictures.  Rummaging in the refrigerator I found a bottle of Vlasik pickles with only a few remaining.  I liberated the pickles and washed the bottle out.  It was into that vessel that our newest captive was deposited.  He fluttered about for a while occasionally settling.  

   We took turns holding the bottle in different positions, striving for a workable picture through this less than optimal glass.  Although the bottle was perfect for pickles, it begged for improvement.  Nevertheless, the pictures we obtained of this male, and a subsequently netted female, were far superior to our previous efforts, taken through the net.

    On our next attempt we captured a female, far more dusky than the brilliant white male.  Sadly , our best effort to photograph this interesting insect was attempted through the portion of the jar lined with residual labeling adhesive.  On her website, Caitlin LaBar offers a myriad of  mesh cages and other contraptions that one might use in the study of butterflies.  However, sweetie and I did not find a clear glass container through which one might photograph live buttterflies.  It seems that Ms. LaBar puts her butterflies in plastic envelopes where, eventually, they become substantially more cooperative.

Clearly a pickle jar has its drawbacks.

    Before we gave up the ghost, we were treated to a close look at an Echo Azure Butterfly.  He was on the wing and despite being quite close, he eluded my efforts with the net.  One can never tell, simply by looking at a field guide, how big these butterflies might be,  I had suspected that this species was quite small, like the Spring White.   Two days earlier, I had to squelch my imagination as it attempted to turn spring whites blue.  I can now report that this blue butterfly, apparently the only blue found in Clark and Skamania Counties, is twice as big as the tiny spring whites.  Although we did not see it later in the season, in 2021, perhaps we will get another chance at Dougan Falls next week.  Assuming that there is an interlude in the cold rain.

jeff