On the Wing

Endangered Karner Blue / G2 Imperiled Status

Posted on October 19

There is something strange afoot here in Cobalt, New York. I feel it. Every time I feel I am getting closer, the answers slip from my fingers. It seems as though someone does not want me to know more about the butterfly, or about the peculiar goings-on.

Though I will not disclose the location specifically—you will just have to take my word for it—I came across a hole in the earth that leads to a sort of collection of passageways under Cobalt. The surroundings around the mouth of what I will now call the mineshaft (for what else could it be?) is showing strange symptoms of poisoned earth. The last time I entered the hole, I spotted another one of these mutant butterflies. It was so close to death, having been born with an incomplete body, not fully metamorphosed. I don’t know what to do about my findings, as they aren’t really concrete. However, I feel that I’ve stumbled upon something. These two things have to be connected. Nothing in nature is coincidence.

As I was observing a few small whites flying playfully in a splash of sun—as they are always seeking warmth, being cold-blooded creatures and all—I realized how my eyes had longed to see a butterfly or anything flying in the air around town. When it is cold and cloudy, sometimes I will not see an insect at all, as they mostly hibernate. Butterflies in the area that are born from their chrysalis late in the year tend to go into suspended animation called diapause in order to survive the harsh cold. I’ve heard that butterflies in the Arctic do this in order to be there to pollinate the flowers in the springtime. I feel saddened at the end of a season. I do not look forward to the cold. The encroaching cold reminds me that I will not see many of my favorite sights for months. I take comfort in the thought that they will return when the sun strengthens. I can’t imagine what it would be like for the ice to melt next spring and still not see them flying. Endangerment and extinction terrify me more than anything else.

The Karner Blue, lycaeides melissa samuleis, Plebejus, was named by the famous Vladimir Nabokov after the town in which he’d first identified it: Karner, New York. For a small creature, it has a lot of names. I’ve never seen one, not here—too far south from the Capitol district. But it is quite extraordinary even in photographs. The male’s topside is a bright vibrant blue with pumpkin crescents; the female is a grayish brown. They both have a smattering of black spots circled in white. I am going to collect some photos to see if this Singh Blue could be a Karner gynandromorph.

Why is the Karner endangered? That’s the question many lepidopterists are asking. Some believe its decline is correlated to the destruction of its main food source, the lupine. Others worry about the lack of canopy under which the females seek shelter and shade to deposit their eggs. Many agree with that one detail, whether the Karner prefers living in flowering lupine or not, whether it likes oak savannahs, old fields or pine barrens—they all believe it’s habitat destruction that has caused its demise. Sometimes nature, too, makes creatures not fit for the environment.

I read about a moth in a museum in London that emerged from its cocoon as a gynandromorph. Half of its body was female and the other half male, though it wasn’t as complete as a true hermaphrodite and lacked complete anatomy to actually reproduce as a male or female. It’s amazing to see, but also, so sad. If this is a Karner gynandromorph, then nature is playing a cruel joke on us all. Instead of producing an endangered creature, she offers this newly emerged butterfly nothing. Without the ability to mate or lay eggs, its birth and death will not impact their already struggling species.

1 COMMENT

I agree; I am sorry. It’s almost like a harsh message from the wild stating her time is almost over. —BF Girl NY