Wednesday, September 17, 2003
Butterfly Companion
We had a company picnic today, with steamed crabs. Went great. One of the guys noticed a pretty butterfly fluttering around. He was headed out to play football but pointed it out to me saying, "I tried to catch it for you but I couldn't." It landed on the far side of a garbage can, I walked around and watched it slowly open and close its wings. At one of the wing closings I picked it up gently and carried it over to where some other people were sitting. I set it on my hand, thinking it would probably fly away. It sat on my hand for about 20 minutes, licking my hand. The tongue felt wet! I had had some cake so I figured it was eating the sugar off my hand. Eventually it flew off. When I got home I checked the web. It was a red-spotted purple admiral. The amusing thing is that they prefer carrion and dung, though they will eat sugar. It was probably attracted to the crab meat on my hand, not the cake. |  |
