While hiking and photographing wildflowers on one of the prairie meadows at Prairie State Park (southwest Missouri) the other day, I came upon a very muddy area that was caused by recent rains and aggravated by bison grazing the area. As I approached this area, what seemed like hundreds of small butterflies abruptly flew up into the air.
These beauties are Eastern Tailed Blues (Everes comyntas) and are very small; their wingspan ranges a whopping 7/8″ to 1 1/8″! Knowing that they would again settle into this wet area, I kneeled down with my camera on the tripod in the general area where they had been located. Within a couple of minutes, many of them began settling back down on the damp soil. Here are a few images I captured of these small butterflies:
I was really hoping to see some of the larger butterflies on the prairie (i.e., swallowtails) but our temperatures have been on the cool side and the conditions not quite right to attract them … maybe next time!