Butterfly/Moth ID

[Lindsaylew82]

Hard to see, but the inside wings were bright iridescent blue. Never seen this one here!







Those blue wide parts at the bottom of the wings look like little beads. Round.

[applestar]

Was it like this on the inside?

Red Spotted Purple butterfly

It is attracted to spoiled fruits. I get them around this time of the summer when many of my brown rot affected plums are rotting on the branches. (There HAS to be a silver lining )

[Lindsaylew82]

No, but I've seem those around my fruit trees, too.

This one is much smaller. See the bases on the bottom wings? They have beads at the end with little wispy strands that criss-cross when they're closed. It WAS very fast when it flew, so I couldn't really see what it looked like on the inside, but it was very bright, very iridescent.

It was rubbing its wings together back and forth. I don't know if that means that it was freshly emerged?

[applestar]

It certainly looks very fresh and brightly colored.

Try this. Enter your county to narrow down some more:

Regional Species Checklists
To generate a regional checklist of butterfly and/or moth species, select a species type, select a region from the drop-down menu(s), and be sure to click "Apply."

Butterflies of South Carolina, United States
The BAMONA database currently includes verified sighting records for 152 butterfly species from this region.

https://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/chec ... e=0&tid=69

[Lindsaylew82]

Found it!!! It's a Great Purple Hairstreak!

On this site.
https://www.discoverlife.org/mp/20q?guide=Butterflies

Looks like this when it opens it's wings!

[applestar]

Wow that's gorgeous!

(I WAS wondering if it could be a hairstreak from your description but we don't get fancy ones like THAT around here.)

And thanks for the link -- that looks like a useful site to bookmark

[Lindsaylew82]

It was stingy with its beauty, though...

I haven't seen it back, but it has been raining nonstop for 3 days.

They seem to really like the lantana and the HUGE MARIGOLDS!

They really are big this year! This is one plant out a 6 cell pack, next to my (96 percentile for height) 3 year old.