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By Michael A. Quinn*
During the first week of 2003, I was corresponding with Michael Overton of
Boone, Iowa about Paul Opler and Andrew Warren's recently published Scientific
Names List. In an email, I noted that they included Tegosa anieta in their checklist,
possibly based on Raymond Neck's inclusion of this species in his 1996 Texas butterfly field guide, but that neither Edward Knudson, Charles Bordelon, nor I
knew the source of the record.
Overton replied that there's a Texas specimen of this species in the Natural
History Museum of Los Angeles County (LACM) as published in Ferris' 1989
Supplement. Overton contacted Brian Harris, Curatorial Assistant of the LACM who
reported the following label data for the specimen:
TEXAS: Nacogdoches Co.
Lake San Rayburn
VIII.6.1977
on buttonbush flowers
coll. M. Wolfe
I emailed Edward Riley (Collections Manager at Texas A&M University), Chris
Durden, Knudson and Bordelon to see if they knew of an "M. Wolfe".
Durden suggested it might be Mimi Wolfe, a Victor Emanuel Nature Tour (VENT) leader. He
thought she was in Nacogdoches at that time. In the process of tracking her
down, I realized that her name is spelled "Wolf" (without an
"e"), but I decided to call her anyway as the pieces otherwise seemed fit
so well.
In reaching her by phone, she said that she distinctly remembered the day
that she collected the specimen!!!
Mimi Hoppe Wolf
1285 Don Corley Dr.
Nacogdoches, Texas 75965
936-569-6531
dewolf@inu.net
Wolf is a former butterfly collector who went on to become an accomplished artist, horse breeder and birder. (She said that she also remembered meeting Durden once. Seems that they
co-led a VENT Tour as naturalists on the River Amazon!)
I re-contacted Harris to confirm the spelling of
"Wolfe" on the label, which he did. This is odd as Mimi said she
labeled it herself...
Tegosa anieta is briefly mentioned in a few U.S. publications (see References), but the only
field guide in which it's listed as an accepted species is Neck's
Texas butterfly guide. Tegosa anieta can be quite common in southern
Tamaulipas, Mexico.
*Invertebrate Biologist
Wildlife Diversity Branch
Texas Parks & Wildlife
3000 South IH-35, Suite 100
Austin, Texas 78704
mike.quinn@tpwd.state.tx.us
Atlas of Western USA
Butterflies, Including Adjacent Parts of Canada and Mexico
Raymond E. Stanford and
Paul A. Opler. 1993.
Denver and Fort Collins. Privately Printed
["Phyciodes anieta" mapped for Nacogdoches Co., TX and Tamaulipas, MX.]
The Common Names of North American Butterflies.
Jacqueline Y. Miller (Ed. & contributor) with S. M. Borkin, C. D. Ferris, J.
Hinchliff, D. Matthews Lott, L. D. Miller, R. M. Pyle, O. Shields, and J. H.
Shepard. 1992.
Smithsonian Press, Washington, D. C., 177 pp.
[pg 88: "Tegosa anieta luka" listed, but without a common name.]
A Field Guide to Butterflies of Texas
Raymond W. Neck, 1996.
Gulf Publishing Co., Houston (out of print)
[The singular U.S. butterfly field guide to include this species as valid.
However, the range is given (in part) as: "Venezuela to Mexico and extreme
southern U.S.; Texas-very rare stray to Rio Grande
Valley." Common name listed as "Anieta". pg 129]
A Field Guide to Eastern Butterflies.
Paul A. Opler and Vichai Malikul. 1998.
Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston
[pg 350: Tegosa anieta luka Higgins, listed as "Hypothetical Species in Eastern North America".]
Scientific Names
List for Butterfly Species of North America, North of Mexico
Paul A. Opler & Andrew D. Warren, 2002
Gillette Publications, Fort Collins, CO (Updated
PDF version)
[Binomial with author listed without further annotation.]
Supplement to: A Catalogue/Checklist of the Butterflies of America North
of Mexico.
Clifford D. Ferris. ed. 1989.
The Lepidopterists' Society, Memoir No.3. (out of print)
[pg. 46: "There is a specimen from Texas of this species in the LACM"
and "The subspecific assignment is based solely on geography and is
tentative."]
Addendum
-----Original Message-----
From: David E. Wolf [mailto:dewolf@inu.net]
Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2003 2:49 PM
To: Mike Quinn
Subject: Tegosa label
Dear Mike,
How exciting to be formally recognized in retrospect for what seemed such an
insignificant event at the time!
In thinking about it, I believe that I probably had just written the
collecting data on the glassine envelope in which the specimen was deposited.
It was sent unspread to Dan Jundanian, who was in fact, probably the one who
prepared the specimen and would have written the label. It is a VERY
common thing for others to add an "e" at the end of Wolf, so that is
not at all surprising to me.
Yesterday afternoon after talking with you, I was unable to relocate the
letter from him that had resurfaced during a recent round of desk-cleaning.
Either I put it somewhere "safe" that I cannot now recall, or else I
disposed of it. ( I can't imagine I would have done that after all this time,
but maybe so...)
In looking back through David's [Mimi's husband] notebooks, he had noted that
the summer of 1977 was an exceptionally hot and dry period for East Texas.
The water level at Lake Sam Rayburn was extremely low, and the lakebed was
overgrown with grass and other vegetation. We were looking for early
migrant birds, but found an abundance of butterflies in the receding lakebed,
including the small, unassuming orange one that, although I could not identify,
did not strike me as anything to get excited about. I remember wondering
whether to even send it to Mr. Jundanian, as he had asked for showy East Texas
specimens, such as Eastern Tiger Swallowtail for his collection, but decided to
include it anyway along with the more eye-catching larger specimens.
So he must be credited, too for attempting to identify it.
Funny how things work sometimes...
Cheers'
Mimi
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