Beautiful work Mike

Brown colored butterflies are flitting over grassland habitats across all 48 States now. Common Wood-Nymph (Cercyonis pegala) have a wingspan of about two inches (Pyle 2002). Usually seen in numbers especially at moist soil sites (pics at gravel road shoulder moistened by nearby woodland seep).

Gray Hairstreak (Strymon melinus) showed up in garden yesterday taking nectar from ornamental oregano. "Most widespread hairstreak" (Opler & Wright 1999) across the country. Stunning even at only an inch or so in size :-)

Yes SoCal, American Rubyspot are special in their own way for a damselfly...metallic coloration in this case. Very cool to find and photograph.

Sedge Sprite is a small damselfly measuring an inch in length. Uses the vegetated shore of wetlands usually nestled in dense stands aquatic plants. Commonly found in States east and north of Nebraska.

Visiting wetlands? Look for damselfly now in tall shore grasses. Wings held at 45 degrees away from body, distinct. ID by examining male abdominal appendages. In this case they are shaped like a lyre. Ergo it is a Lyre-tipped Damselfly.