6
Wednesday, August 9, 2017 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Tales from a
Sisters
Naturalist
by Jim Anderson
Of butterflies
The most wonderful thing
about writing this column is
the phone calls and emails.
Last week, the phone was
ringing off the hook (and
vibrating in my pocket) with
all you wonderful people
calling to tell me about the
outbreak of “monarch butter-
flies” that have taken over the
foothills of the Cascades.
But I’m sorry to say, those
are California tortoiseshell
butterflies, not monarchs.
California tortoiseshells
winter over as adults, and
somehow this is an advan-
tage to their survival and
helps them to build up their
numbers. Then, when things
are right (and I have no idea
what “things” that may be)
their numbers reach a point
where the sheer numbers
brings about an outbreak.
They have done it two
times (as far as I know) since
I rolled into Bend on my
Harley back in 1951. Thirty
years ago, an outbreak simi-
lar to this one took place in
Northern California and was
seen all the way to Bend.
Unless research is carried out
annually within the tortoise-
shell populations, it’s proba-
bly difficult to really put your
finger on this or that cause.
But no matter; it’s astonish-
ing when it takes place.
I believe this remarkable
phenomena is tied to nature’s
way of ensuring survival
of a species. Perhaps, when
weather and food plants are
in balance, close to 100 per-
cent of a butterfly’s larvae get
what they need to develop the
necessary chemicals to meta-
morphose into adults suc-
cessfully. They mate and lay
prodigious numbers of eggs;
which in turn hatch — and
because of the sheer numbers
defoliate their food plants —
which I have a hunch is even
good for the plants in some
PHOTO BY JIM ANDERSON
Juvenile Western screech owl.
way.
While this is going on,
butterfly parasites also go
into supercharge mode and
somehow have the ability
to lay eggs on the kajillions
of caterpillars. During the
similar event some 30 years
ago, my wife, Sue, and I
were living in Bend, having
just returned from southeast
Arizona where I was man-
ager of the Ramsey Canyon
Preserve.
During that outbreak of
the mid-’080s, we were told
tortoiseshell butterfly cater-
pillars in the Tumalo Creek
watershed were defoliating
all the ceanothus west of
town. We were living in Bend
at the time, and of course,
Sue and I packed up our son,
Reuben (Miriam and Caleb
hadn’t arrived yet) and went
out to Tumalo Falls to take
a look. It was astonishing to
see that many butterflies fill-
ing the air, and to actually
hear their wings as they flit-
tered about, as well as lar-
vae munching on ceanothus
leaves.
When we returned a short
time later we found uncount-
able numbers of chrysalids
hanging on the bare branches
of the ceanothus. We then
discovered by accident that
if we got close to them and
stomped our feet they would
all begin to shake and, I
thought, clang like tiny bells.
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We removed 20 chrysa-
lids from the underside of
the bare branches by using
my pocketknife to cut the
thin, silk pedicle attaching
the chrysalis to the branch
and took them home with
us to photograph emerging
butterflies. However, if my
memory serves me correctly,
of the 20 chrysalids, eight or
nine developed as butterflies.
Bright green parasitic wasps
emerged from all the others.
During that outbreak I
also recall the California
highway department install-
ing special truck washing
equipment near Redding that
was used to wash smashed
butterflies out of the radiators
to keep the trucks from over-
heating. And the UPS driv-
ers were having a heck of a
time, driving five miles then
having to stop and clean the
windshields of their trucks.
The OBOL website
(Oregon Birders On Line)
has been buzzing for weeks
with birders sharing the tor-
toiseshell outbreak, and this
one from Barbara and Dan
Gleason of Eugene was par-
ticularly thoughtful as well as
interesting:
“Seeing all the posts, I
thought I’d add that these
massive numbers of butter-
flies were also in the Clear
Lake and McKenzie River
areas too, this past Thursday.
“My granddaughter and
PHOTO BY JIM ANDERSON
California tortoiseshell butterfly.
I were up there for her first
rowboat ride and everywhere
we encountered massive
numbers of tortoiseshells,
to the point it made driving
quite hazardous since one
couldn’t help but want to
avoid killing them, but one
could not drive as slowly as
one need to accomplish this.
“We were glad to get off
the highway and head to the
lake where one could drive to
allow them to pass by the car.
They were largely not over
the lake but were everywhere
along the roadsides, espe-
cially near water...culverts,
outhouses, included!
“Along the edge of the
lake when one moved too
quickly, they would all take
flight and one could hear
their wingbeats, too.”