The Rarest Butterfly I Have Collected

I never never encountered it in the east, and the western one I do have is much different looking.

The topic is interesting given people who buy specimens versus self-collecting. I'd think something unique I netted myself as most special and memorable in the rare department versus the actual global rarity of the species.

Some of my favorite species:

Mottled Duskywing - I found a decent locality of this species that has declined in the east and is almost entirely extirpated from most of its range except for barrens habitats scattered in the Appalachians and New York. I have three specimens over two dates and never saw it anywhere else.

Appalachian Tawny Crescent - The subspecies maconensis is found only in the high hills of western North Carolina and the species is extirpated everywhere else south of Canada in the east. I have a small series there from a roadside where they flew with Northern Crescents (=incognitus) but not with typical tharos in the richer woodland.

Leonard's Skipper - my favorite specimen despite it not being that "rare" in the north. I have a specimen from 2009 in the sandhills of SC. This worn male is the only one I've heard of from SC since the mid-2000's and it hasn't been recorded since despite lots of watchers going and checking the area.

Berry's skipper - Outside Florida, good luck finding this species! I have one from coastal SC where it is extremely rare and often confused for dark female Byssus Skippers

Southern vagrants are also cool but I never got anything too interesting in SC (like a tropical Phoebis or Giant Sphinx or White Witch).

Then there are those "rare" species that you never find despite many trips, but they aren't really rare at all. I can get some good eastern butterflies but yet I have never seen a Comptons Tortoiseshell or a Hayhurst's Scallopwing. The Appalachian Gold-banded Skipper and Olympia Marble are another I await catching.

Mota massyla ( Lycaenidae ) collected in January 2017 near Chiang Mai-Thaialnd

Dodona dracon ( Riodininae ) female, 
Males are locally uncommon and can be found in few locations, but female I collected In Lampang, Thailand in January 2017 is the first specimen recored. The photo of this specimen can be viewed on my friend Yutaka Inayoshi's website 
yutaka.it-n.jp/rio/8a090010.html

Famegana alsulus eggletoni ( Lycaenidae ) very rare, I collected on Ko Tao, Thailand where colonies are still in some numbers.

There are few more species that are rare or locally common but those three above are the once worth mentioning 


Paul 

I'm always suspicious of the term "rare", what does it mean exactly? I prefer the terms hardly ever seen, not often collected, hardly ever for sale, local, hard to catch, a lot of species are very secretive in their habits, need careful searching for to obtain them and a lot of patience, rare to me is a term overused by dealers to bump up prices.

For me, my capture of Catocala marmorata or my netted Antheraea polyphemus gynandromorph would be the rarest/very seldom encountered bugs. Oddly......both of these were caught a mere few feet apart in two consecutive years at the top of the same TN mountain.....talk abt luck.

I caught the only known record (maybe more have been collected since, but I'm not sure) for Thailand of Giganteopalpus mirabilis many years ago when I was collaborating on Sphingid research here. It was a big surprise, because we put a sheet out at the wildlife sanctuary guest house before going into the forest to set up our main light trap, and I went back to the guest house just before dark to check that no-one had turned off the light and it was already sitting on the sheet, even though it wasn't yet dark. In general we found that the more unusual species tended only to fly at about dusk or just after, and then the commoner species would come in a little later.

Adam.

Hesperia meskei straton is now Hesperia meskei pinocayo. Where and when did this occur. I have specimens from Navy Wells, Dade County, FL 9 September 1980. I have collected Hesperia meskei from Martin County and Liberty County in Florida. It can be rather common in Jonathan Dickenson S.P. in Martn County in early October. I also have a record, but no specimen, from Homestead Air Force Base, Dade County, Florida from 16 May 1980. It is in my card file with a ?? after the date. I think I gave it to someone in the Metro Dade nature Preserve group way back when.

John Hyatt, I plan to return to Poverty next April to look for Pyrgus centaraea wyandoti. Are you interested? I may also make an attempt in early June to very over Big Jax Mountain Highland County to find Hesperia sassacus.

I have taken Atrytonopsis loamii in North Carolina near the Green Swamp. Both were singletons a year apart. I have also collect Atrytonopsis loammi in South Carolina. A location provided by Ron Gatrelle. The location was developed sometime in the late 1990's.I have taken it in numerous locations in Florida.

There was once a number of very active Lepidopterist who traded information on various species very freely. As I have said before, if you know the habitat, you can usually find what you are looking for.