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Long-tailed Skipper Urbanus proteus One of the tailed skippers. In Arkansas, you can only hope to see one species unless one of the other Urbanus longtails slips up from Texas sometime in the future. Note that greenish-blue head. That color extends onto the body and back into the central hairiness between the wings. Striking things, longtails have a strange cocked-back flight style due, no doubt, to the weight of that tail pipe. The tails, it should be noted, can sometimes be worn or torn off. And then it looks like a very odd Cloudywing. I've seen only one of these in Arkansas. It flew right into my neighborhood. In most of Arkansas, it is basically a stray. Mostly in the major river valleys and in the southwest. Does appear in yards and gardens when it makes its way here. A fast flier. Those tails give it a distinctive flight line. Norm Lavers sees them virtually every year in his NE Arkansas gardens. This is his shot. |
