The Archbold Biological Station Collection of Butterflies

The Archbold Biological Station located in Highlands County, Florida has one of the best natural history reference collections representing south central Florida’s flora and fauna.  The collection is estimated to contain more than 250,000 pinned insect specimens.

On December 29, 2018 I inventoried the Archbold Biological Station’s butterfly specimens.  A summary of my findings was published in the Southern Lepidopterists' News, volume 41, number 2, pages 162-168 (see linked pdf here).  The Archbold collection contains 571 pinned adult butterfly specimens representing 103 taxa. The collection includes imperiled species such as Cyclargus thomasi, Eunica tatila, Anthanassa frisia, Siproeta stelenes, Heraclides aristodemus, Glutophrissa drusilla and many others that are declining and disappearing in Florida.  Many Archbold butterfly specimens have additional information on the labels such as flowers visited, larval host plant, and other data (see linked Excel file here). 

The Station recently received a grant from the National Science Foundation’s Collections in Support of Biological Research program to digitize the natural history collections. Archbold staff have been photographing specimens and entering label information into the searchable online databases iDigBio and Symbiota Collection of Arthropods Network (SCAN). 

Butterflies found at BB Brown's Gardens on July 16, 2016

Following is the list of butterflies that we found at BB Brown's Gardens on July 16, 2016.  It was very hot that day and we found a lot of butterflies such as a Great Purple Hairstreak, White M Hairstreaks, Red-banded Hairstreaks, Viceroys, and Carolina Satyrs on the woodland trail hanging out in the shade under the oak trees.  We had a total of 25 species.

GROUP	SCIENTIFIC NAME	COMMON NAME	NUMBER OF ADULTS
Broad-winged Skippers	Urbanus proteus	Long-tailed Skipper	1
Broad-winged Skippers	Urbanus dorantes	Dorantes Skipper	1
Spread-winged Skippers	Erynnis horatius	Horace's Duskywing	3
Grass Skippers	Cymaenes tripunctus	Three-spotted Skipper	1
Grass Skippers	Lerema accius	Clouded Skipper	1
Grass Skippers	Hylephila phyleus	Fiery Skipper	1
Grass Skippers	Panoquina ocola	Ocola Skipper	2
Swallowtails	Battus philenor philenor	Pipevine Swallowtail	1
Swallowtails	Battus polydamas lucayus	Polydamas Swallowtail	3
Swallowtails	Heraclides cresphontes	Giant Swallowtail	6
Swallowtails	Pterourus glaucus australis	Eastern Tiger Swallowtail	2
Swallowtails	Pterourus troilus troilus	Spicebush Swallowtail	4
Swallowtails	Pterourus palamedes	Palamedes Swallowtail	1
Whites	Ascia monuste phileta	Great Southern White	3
Sulphurs	Phoebis sennae eubule	Cloudless Sulphur	6
Sulphurs	Phoebis philea	Orange-barred Sulphur	1
Hairstreaks	Atlides halesus	Great Purple Hairstreak	1
Hairstreaks	Calycopis cecrops	Red-banded Hairstreak	4
Hairstreaks	Parrhasius m-album	White-M Hairstreak	4
Milkweed Butterflies	Danaus gilippus berenice	Queen	1
Passionflower Butterflies	Agraulis vanillae nigrior	Gulf Fritillary	44
Passionflower Butterflies	Heliconius charithonia tuckeri	Zebra Heliconian	31
Passionflower Butterflies	Euptoieta claudia	Variegated Fritillary	1
Admirals	Limenitis archippus floridensis	Viceroy	2
Satyrs and Wood-Nymphs	Hermeuptychia sosybius	Carolina Satyr	2