June 26, 2013: Oak Bud Licking

In this video you can see one of the many Edwards Hairstreaks that I saw “nectaring” at a young scrub oak buds. I wasn’t aware that this could be a nutrient source for butterflies, but it must be quite enticing because the hairstreaks didn’t seemed bothered by the curious ants that were also drawn to the buds or me and my intrusive camera for that matter. You can clearly see the proboscis fully extended lapping at the bud. Sorry for the blurry section.

June 26: New Hot Spot and Interesting Nectaring Behavior

Nothing aside from the usual suspects on the slope today, but the real find was a sunny patch of scrub oak along the southwest side of the main trail surrounding the observatory that was absolutely teeming with hairstreaks. I spent over an hour in that one spot tapping, tracking, photographing and identifying. I saw a number of pairs of males locked in aerial combat as I saw yesterday. Unfortunately, Oak hairstreaks were not invited to this party. I identified at least 5 Banded and 8 Edwards HS and some were doing a very curious thing. A number of these hairstreaks, especially Edwards, seemed to be nectaring at buds on the scrub oak. There were also ants crawling about the buds (look for them in photo) so I imagine they were secreting something sweet. I took a few videos of this which I will post separately.

Edward’s HS (Satyrium edwardsii) ‘nectaring’ at oak bud