Kent McFarland of the Vermont Center for Ecostudies posted this on the VCE blog. In case you don’t get their material, here’s a way to keep track of the butterflies you see — and have seen. It looks like a great international effort and pretty easy to use. The hard part is photographing and identifying them — they are worse than warblers. Why not bird early in the day and butterfly while the birds are napping? And use eBird and eButterfly to keep track.
From 2002 to 2007 volunteer butterfly enthusiasts spent thousands of hours in the field in an effort to record the status and distribution of Vermont butterflies, the first systematicstatewide butterfly atlas to be undertaken. Observers have since made new discoveries, like the first state record for White-M Hairstreak or the incredible invasion of Giant Swallowtails. Where can we share and store all of our collective butterfly discoveries? Introducing our newest tool for the Vermont Atlas of Life, eButterfly, a project in which VCE is proud to be a partner.