We’ve covered a number of different things you see when out in the woods. Today I thought I would post some of my favorite pictures of butterflies and moths from our trips in southern Indiana.

Sometimes you see a whole group of butterflies together. Many butterflies are scavengers and will eat dead critters or waste products.

We spotted this group looking into a dry riverbed from a bridge in Morgan Monroe State Forest. You can see Tiger (papilio glaucus) and Black (papilio polyxenus) Swallowtails.

We were able to get a couple of shots of skippers (family Hesperiidae). It’s hard to distinguish between the various types, and neither of the pictures were clear enough to be certain, but you can see the distinctive “fighter wing” look of it’s wings in the shot of it on the black and blue hat.

Some butterflies are brilliantly colored. Most are familiar with Monarchs and the like, but sometimes you get brilliant blues, like this Red spotted purple (Limenitis arthemis).

Sometimes you get a great shot of butterflies and flowers. This shot of painted ladies (Vanessa cardui) on this variety of black-eyed susan is striking. The flowers are probably an accidental, more likely to be found in a garden than the woods. Since much of the forests in southern Indiana were once lived in, you see a lot of this sort of thing.

Moths can be amazing to see as well. I really enjoyed this picture of a clymene moth (haploa clymene) that Walt took. It was easy to identify by the fleur-de-lis design.

And we can’t forget the luna moth (Actias luna). Once you see one, you immediately know what it is.

Digging Deeper

I found a couple of interesting sites while checking my identification of these butterflies and moths. This site has a good article on common types of butterflies. This one has nice side by side comparison options, like this page on swallowtails.