Orange-barred Sulphur

The orange-barred sulphur is a large sulphur butterfly found in Florida, south Texas, Mexico, Central America and northern South America. There are usually 2 to 3 brood per year in Florida and the butterflies can be seen year round. Occasionally they migrate north, and in those cases usually have only one brood. The larval host plants are Cassia species in the pea family.

Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge

Last October we made our first trip down to south Florida since 2004. During our past trips we spent most of our time on the Gulf Coast side of the state except for trips to the Everglades, the Keys, and Merrit Island NWR. On this trip I wanted to hit all of our favorite places and explore some new locations. So we ended up staying a couple of night on the east coast near Boca Raton. This was near Loxahatchee NWR which was one of the new locations that I wanted to try out.  

 Loxahatchee is a 145,800 acres of northern Everglades habitat located in Boyton Beach Florida. It was established in 1951 under the authority of the Migratory Bird Conservation Act. Much of the wetlands on the refuge are managed by a series of dikes, canals and other water control structures to preserve habitat for migrating waterfowl. My reason for visiting the refuge was to try and get a glimpse of a swallow-tail kite and a snail kite. Both species of kite can be found on the refuge depending on the season. I think that we were a bit late for the swallow-tail kite but we did manage to get pictures of a snail kite feeding on apple snails. The refuge also had a great butterfly garden around the visitors center. We saw a lot of new species of butterfly including this orange-barred sulphur. Both the kite and the butterfly were both lifer species for us so it was well worth it to check out a new location.

Orange-barred Sulphur

 The orange-barred sulphur is a large yellow-orange butterfly that is found mainly in tropical regions of North, South and Central America. Their range is from the southern United States down to Brazil. In the U.S. this butterfly is found primarily in south Florida where it is a year round resident. Occasionally they will move north and west and rare strays have been spotted as far north as Minnesota and Wisconsin. These photos were taken in Florida

 The male and female orange-barred sulphurs look very different. The males are easy to identify by the orange bars on the upperside of the forewing and orange border on the bottom of the hindwing. This is easy to see but not so easy to photograph as these butterflies usually perch with their wings closed. So I had to try and get the shot as the butterfly opened its wings to fly to the next flower. Females are larger then males and can be whitish or yellow-orange in color. Both color forms of the female have a solid black cell spot.