Ontario Butterfly Atlas updated for 2017 records - 31,000 in all

Records were up this year, from 27,000 last year to 31,000 this year, from more than 500 observers. This wasn't the peak year of 2012, which had almost 34,000 records, but it was close, and second best of all years. Thanks to all of you who contributed your data. The main atlas page is http://www.ontarioinsects.org/atlas/

Perhaps the highlight of the year was the discovery of a new species for Ontario, the European Common Blue, in two areas east of Ottawa. It's an invasive species, unfortunately, although its food plant appears to be an invasive plant, bird's-foot trefoil. Here's a map of locations (click on the green squares to see the location details and full records):

The advanced version of the atlas can be used to generate a list of the number of records for each species in 2017.

This list shows that 9 species had just one observation in the year: Garita Skipperling, Old World Swallowtail, Western White, Checkered White, Cloudless Sulphur, Northern Blue, Frigga Fritillary, Gorgone Checkerspot and Red-disked Alpine. The monarch butterfly was the most commonly observed butterfly, with almost 2,800 records. It was an exceptionally good year for Compton Tortoiseshells, with 290 records in the province. The previous record was last year, with about 180 records. See the year-by-year chart of records for this species in the province on the far right of this page.

2017 was also a big year for observations of the snout butterfly (61 records), the most since the big year of 2012.

The atlas can also be used to see the time of year to look for any particular species in your area of the province. I have been using it to find the time and location to look for the Harvester, which I have yet to spot in my home location of Waterloo Region. Contact me at @amacnaughton if you would like me to call you and give you a tour of what the atlas can do.

For all of the details and analysis for 2017, we will have to wait another two months or so for the publication of the 2017 TEA lepidoptera seasonal summary by Rick Cavasin and Jessica Linton. They're hard at work on it now. Current editions are available to TEA members only, while older editions are posted on the TEA website.

Alan

Posted on February 16, 2018 09:06 PM by dkaposi dkaposi

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