BUTTEEFLrlES OF THE DISTRICT OP COLUMBIA 87 



taller composites, such as thistles, ironweed, joe-pye-weed, boneset, 

 asters, or goldenrod. 



There is a specimen in the National Museum collection from 

 Washington taken in June, 1920. 



Habits. — The flight of this butterfly is rapid and irregular. It 

 darts from side to side and from time to time suddenly changes its 

 course, often coming back to the place from which it started. The 

 flight of the males is more erratic than that of the females, and t\\&y 

 will frequently rise in the air to a considerable height. It usually 

 flies low, onl}^ a foot or so above the grass tops, a series of quick 

 nervous flaps alternating with a short planing in which the wings 

 are extended horizontally. It is sometimes seen flying in a straight 

 line with a continuous flapping of the wings 10 or 15 feet above the 

 ground. When it is engaged in feeding, its flight, though quick and 

 irregular, is less nervous than at other times. 



It is often seen playing about piles of rocks or the rocky sum- 

 mits of hills or the ends of the branches of trees adjacent to ex- 

 posed rocky patches. About trees it usually keeps well above the 

 ground, and its actions here closely resemble those of the hack- 

 berry hutiQv^y {CJdorippe celtis). 



The females are less active than the males, have a less irregular 

 flight, and are less inclined to wander. They keep chiefly to the 

 areas where the food plants grow. If frightened they often fly a 

 few feet and drop into the grass or dodge into a bush after the 

 manner of the red admiral, while the males, so far as I have seen, 

 either fly swiftly away and are lost to sight or circle irregularly 

 about, returning to a point near that from which they started. 



When the butterflies are feeding, their wings usually are closed 

 and the fore wings are drawn well out, exposing the pink on the 

 under surface; from time to time the wings are suddenly opened 

 and again closed. Occasionally, however, an individual will feed 

 with the wings partially extended. 



When the insect is sunning itself on a leaf or on the gi'ound, the 

 wings are opened not quite to the horizontal. 



Wlien the two occur together this species is seen to be less gen- 

 erally distributed than the painted lady {Pyrameis cardui) , but pos- 

 sibly this is because it is usually less abundant. It keeps mainly to 

 the fields and meadows, freelj^ visiting gardens, although it is com- 

 mon on barren rocky hillsides wherever the food plant is abundant. 

 Here it suns itself on the bare rocks after the fashion of P. cardui 

 instead of on leaves as is its more usual habit. It is seldom seen 

 along the beaches and it avoids the woods. 



/Seasons. — In the last half of May, more rarely early in May, a 

 few ragged individuals appear which have emerged from hiberna- 

 66544—32 7 



