This is a new yellow butterfly for me this year with sightings in my garden in July, August & September as shown in the gallery Marcellina Sulphur, Phoebis marcellina. There are many different yellows as you can see in their “Family Gallery” of my photos: Pieridae – WHITES, YELLOWS & SULPHURS (40 species). I will never tire of all the unique species of butterflies found here in Costa Rica and the almost continuous finding of new species like this one. Tomorrow I will share a photo of a more common Yellow seen here, the Dina Yellow. But here is just one photo of the Marcellina Sulphur . . .
Seen in my garden before, another big brown, fuzzy Skipper that at times seem like the majority of the butterflies! 🙂 I’ve had this one in my garden one other time, back in 2023 as shown in my gallery: Wind’s Skipper, Windia windi. (Linked to the gallery.)
This is one of those that are almost impossible to identify with no matches in any of my sources of those spots and other characteristics. The AI called Google Lens is for the entire world and on difficult individuals like this one, they might call it a butterfly that lives only in Asia or Africa, so not as helpful on ones like this as they are on very unique and unusual insects they can find another photo of. So far, iNaturalista’s AI is the most helpful on butterflies, but not always. In the case of this one, as far as they will go in identification is to put it in the Hesperini Tribe which is pretty broad or general. As I write this, I haven’t yet posted these photos on iNaturalist yet. But when I do there is a real possibility that one of the experts who have devoted their lives to butterflies will have an identification, but not always. Here’s three photos of this Skipper Butterfly that I cannot ID:
I think it is most likely the Telemiades nicomedes, but not sure, so giving it the genus name. iNaturalist uses the genus name a lot as you can see on this Genus Telemiades page of iNaturalist Costa Rica.
Telemiades Genus of Skipper, Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
As my last post from the Tortuguero Adventure, I’m introducing just one of several unusual flowers at Tortuga Lodge & Gardens which help them live up to the “gardens” part of their name. The iNaturalist AI is “confident” that the flowers in both of these photos are in the Genus Columnea (linked to Wikipedia taxonomy article) or you can see other examples in Costa Rica that have been submitted with that genus, including some with specific species, on iNaturalistCR-Genus-Columnea. And as the first “suggestion” species on both these similar but different photos, they give the species name Columnea nicaraguensis. (linked to photos of that species on iNaturalist Costa Rica). And that is most likely the correct species of these two photos even though they seem a little different.
Columnea nicaraguensis, Tortuga Lodge & Gardens, Tortuguero National Park, Limón, Costa RicaColumnea nicaraguensis, Tortuga Lodge & Gardens, Tortuguero National Park, Limón, Costa Rica
Be sure to check out the FLOWERS gallery in the Trip Gallery and notice other interesting flowers like the Peacock Flower, Night-scented Orchid and Pheasant’s Tail! 🙂
¡Pura Vida!
Tomorrow it is back to photos from my garden and for about a week, shots made in early September that I held for now. 🙂
For the last two weeks I’ve shared photos made on my 4-night trip to “The Amazon of Costa Rica,” Tortuguero National Park. And that was only the “tip of the iceberg” of the many photos made. See them all in the above gallery! Having this kind of nature adventures is why I chose to live out my retirement in Costa Rica and it has already surpassed my hopes and dreams and though I have to slow down some, the adventures continue! Sometimes in my little backyard garden! 🙂
This Heliconius erato (scientific name) has the English Common Name of “Red Postman” as opposed to the Heliconius melpomene rosina (my gallery link) which is often called just plain “Postman.” There is only a slight difference in both the red and the white bars on these two similar butterflies
And note that this one in today’s post has a very long Spanish Common Name here in Costa Rica: “Mariposa de Alas Largas de Bandas Carmesí.” See more of my many photos of this “Red Postman” Heliconius erato in that linked gallery. The two photos here were made near my room at Tortuga Lodge & Gardens, Tortuguero National Park, Limón, Costa Rica.
Erato Heliconian or Red Postman, Tortuga Lodge & Gardens, Tortuguero National Park, Limón, Costa RicaContinue reading “Red Postman”
Every morning at Tortuga Lodge & Gardens there were two little flocks of two species of toucans directly behind my room eating berries from different trees; Keel-billed Toucans and Yellow-throated Toucans. Here’s just one photo of each species with more in my species galleries linked below the photos.
Yellow-throated Toucan, Tortuga Lodge & Gardens, Tortuguero National Park, Limón, Costa RicaKeel-billed Toucan, Tortuga Lodge & Gardens, Tortuguero National Park, Limón, Costa Rica
See more photos from this trip and from many other places in Costa Rica, including my gardens at home, with a gallery for each species:
Keel-billed Toucan – On Caribbean Slope & in Central Valley (much of which is Pacific Slope like where I live)
Photographed on my last morning in Tortuguero (yesterday) and these are probably my favorite bird photos bird photos from this trip. 🙂 Chestnut-colored Woodpecker, Celeus castaneus (linked to my gallery. I’ve seen this unusual woodpecker only one other time and that was in the South Caribbean, at Manzanillo. Tortuguero is in the North Caribbean. It is found from Mexico to Panama. And this is my first time to see a woodpecker eating a flower! 🙂
