Butterfly in the parking lot

Before heading off to the airport and back home, we did a walk around the Atlanta downtown area and I was pleasantly surprised to see this butterfly fluttering about on a flowered bush next to a busy public parking lot.  I will miss both butterflies and flowers soon as the clock is counting down until summer is gone and autumn is here.

I’m not sure what kind of butterfly this is but if you know please leave the name in the comments; thank you.

 

 

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Two visitors to the coneflower patch

Bee and butterfly; at least I think it’s a butterfly.  No clue as to what kind but if you know please leave the name in the comments and thanks.  After yesterday’s “stinky” post I felt something lighter and brighter would be in order especially since this weekend I will be celebrating my birthday.

I’m going to try and fit some champagne into the weekend somewhere… that’s light, bright and bubbly 🙂

 

 

 

 

Monarch on a Butterfly Bench

F5.6 – 1/200 – ISO 100 – 100mm macro – Canon 5D M3

How to confuse a photographer

Interesting title, huh?  In this case it was this one little butterfly that threw me entirely for a loop.  When I was sifting through my photos of the butterflies this one caught my eye because of it’s wings; two different colors!  Initially I thought this was some new amazing species but while I looked and looked through all of my resources I could not find one like it.  Frustrated and confused I took a wild stab at just Googling what I was seeing.

What came up was the answer to my confusion.  This is a Myscelia ethusa/ Mexican Bluewing butterfly.  It’s upper side is black with iridescent blue bands with white spots.  The iridescence of it’s wings can cause it to look various shades of blue to even purple depending on how light hits it.  Eureka! Now I had the answer to why it looked this way.  Somehow the light was hitting it’s wings just so resulting in them looking like this.  Problem solved…

 

 

 

Zebra Palm King

In black and white; original color photo here.  While butterflies normally – because of their beautiful colors – do not convert very well to monochrome, occasionally you may find one that does look fantastic in monochrome because of it’s colors and patterns.  In this case it didn’t hurt that the tree branch it was on was just full of texture which I think compliments the image.

 

Sylvia

I believe this is a Clipper Butterfly (Parthenos sylvia) found in South and South East Asia.  I’m always amazed at the patterns and colors on butterflies and moths.

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Which end is up?

I’ve forgotten the name of this one but I recall an employee at the Butterfly Wonderland telling me it was a Zebra something or other – possibly a Zebra Palm King.   What I noticed about it is that his top and bottom are a bit similar.  Seems this species has evolved to have a bottom that looks like it could be the top so that if a predator were to take a nip of the one “head” it could live to flutter for another day.

BTW – This critter and tree limb look amazing in monochrome.  Will share it with you on Monday.