It's Butterfly Month Again

In the past two days (not counting today, which is cold and windy), I've seen 10 different species of butterflies in our garden.  No monarchs yet, but a good variety of others, and I got a reasonable picture of several.  Here are the highlights.

This bright orange fritillary was the highlight, though it didn't want to sit still for long.  If I'm reading the patterns on the wing correctly, this is an Aphrodite Fritillary.

 
This Mourning Cloak did sit still, ignoring me, but it wouldn't open it wings to reveal the beautiful inner pattern.

I caught this Red Admiral several times; here it's perched on a fencepost resting.

And here it's long proboscis was probing up and down into the florets of this Coneflower.

This one appears to be a Coral Hairstreak.  They're hard to tell apart, but this is the only one without a 'tail' on the hind wing.

This species, the Northern Pearly-Eye seems to haunt the shrubs and fencerow rather than the garden.  You have to examine the dots on these ones carefully to tell them apart.

And finally, here's a Clouded Sulphur hiding in the grass of our lawn - another one that doesn't like to sit still.  It's been a good two days for butterflies.  Now if only we'd see a Monarch visiting some of our Milkweed!

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