"Have you ever seen a Mourning Cloak?"
The question pops out, as it always does, when the topic of butterflies comes up. In this case, with a fellow volunteer who mentioned participating in butterfly surveys as we were cutting brush along the trail. (A few years ago, the query would have been about an American Snout, my previous lepidopteran white whale, which was checked off my list a few years ago.)
Alas, the Mourning Cloak proved to be a missing checkmark on the butterfly surveyor's list as well, as we opined on its elusive loveliness: a large butterfly with russet-brown wings edged in creamy white, with a black border spotted with cornflower blue between. It was one of those striking butterflies you admire as you're paging through a field guide, and distinctive enough to know when you see it.
Mere days later, tootling along the trail on a bicycle (at a quite leisurely pace both to easily spot and dismount to photograph anything of interest, as well as to avoid the abundant grasshoppers sunning themselves on the pavement), a large butterfly rose from a puddle of rainwater and bobbed slowly past.
 |
| Is it....? |
gasp
gasp!
GASP!!!
Was it?! Definite creamy white edges on largeish wings, visible even as it bobbed away behind me. By the time I dismounted and got the camera ready, it was skimming above the leafy treetops, dipping in and out of view just beyond reach of my lens before disappearing entirely. I paced pathetically, retracing my path back to the puddle in case it returned. Eventually giving up, I remounted the bike and resumed my course, whereupon I almost immediately glimpsed the same creamy-white edged wings ahead.
I bit more ready, but still slow, I managed to get a few shots of the wings as it rapidly fluttered out of range and again disappeared into the treetops. As I rode home, I kicked myself for not being able to get a good shot while also questioning what I really saw. Was it a Mourning Cloak? Or could it have been a band-winged grasshopper, many of which have superficially similar dark wings with pale edges.
In addition to being beautiful, Mourning Cloaks have an interesting lifecycle. They are one of only a handful of butterflies (out of more than 100 species in Iowa) that overwinter as adults, tucked away in tree bark and other hidey-holes. They appear early in spring and lay eggs, which hatch and eventually pupate. Those adults emerge in midsummer but only briefly: in the heat of summer they estivate (a kind of hibernation during hot weather) until fall, when they will again emerge, eat, and prepare for their long winter sleep.
Mourning Cloak larvae use willows, cottonwood, hackberry, and other trees as hosts; adults don't normally nectar at flowers but rather dine on tree sap and rotting fruit. They can be found throughout North America, even up into Alaska, and also throughout Europe and parts of Asia.
Back home, able to examine the photos, I'm convinced I finally saw my Mourning Cloak. It's a big like footage of bigfoot: distant and blurry. But definitely a butterfly, with rusty-red wings edged in creamy white!
Sources/Additional Reading
- Missouri Department of Conservation: Mourning Cloak
- BugGuide: Species Nymphalis antiopa - Mourning Cloak - Hodges#4432
- University of Minnesota Department of Entomology: Mourning Cloak
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