Brenda and I burst the weighty bonds of a days’ worth of spring house and lawn work to run out over the edge of Lincoln County Saturday, the 29th, when an all too rare sun break struck Spokane at sunrise with the brilliance of a July morning. Just the brilliance; not the heat. Braving the chill in hope of a warming trend that might never have come, we headed to one of the most reliable local habitats for Green Hairstreaks, especially the Sheridan’s, who scatter an iridescence about the trails along the shores of Fishtrap Lake that reward the more observant Eastern Washington butterfly lovers. As was the case in nearly every early spring scabland walk we’ve shared in the last several years, Brenda saw them first, tiny, dazzling wings that lit upon the lomatium and then disappeared all too readily over the green of the damp grasses and forbs. We hiked out a couple miles to look out over the lake, then sat to watch the fishermen below and the violet green swallows all about. The four hours of dereliction from our household duties brought me my best butterfly day of the season, though it warmed only to 60 for a high that day: eight Sheridan’s Greenies, one Anise Swallowtail, a passel of whites, with a Cabbage White and a large Marble the only sure ID’s among them; three Sara’s Orangetips and one blazing fresh male Silvery Blue. All the more a delight with their arrival about four weeks later than when we first saw them last year.

This has been a tough winter and an even tougher early spring, has it not? I am including a couple of photos that will give you a glimpse of what happens to Eastern Washington sage-steppe locales when subjected to levels of rainfall more typical of Western Washington. “Vernal pools” indeed! Check out Turnbull Wildlife Refuge, where fences are mostly under water, making signage at the refuge boundary appear to be directed to waterfowl and fish “swim here, and you’ll be safe!” Southeast of the refuge, the scenic, winding entry channels to Bonnie Lake in northern Whitman county have been completely submerged, acres of cattail marsh now invisible, so that the entire rocky, walled valley looks like a giant bath tub! Unpaved roads are getting washed out. Up higher, Mt. Spokane remains under 82″ snow cover at the summit. As for paved roads, the potholes here are plentiful, deep and broad enough to bury all your kin. Fresh snow, may I say, intruded this week. One cross country ski buff I know actually celebrates this fact. A local weather reporter ascribed our oddly cool, wet season, with more than double average precip from January through April, 2017, to a Siberian air mass that had lost its way somewhere out off the coast of Kamchatka, heading for North America. Am I discouraged? Yes! Defeated? Heck, no! I suggest carrying your net, camera and field guides, any- way, just in case. We expect significantly warmer conditions by the first weekend of May.

All this moisture will have implications for our field season. A great variety of nectar sources and larval hosts will be lush and colorful, gobs of blossoms this May where perhaps there were a handful last year. Watch the places where camas grows. The purple blooms may paint the landscape with rivers of color where we saw only single flower heads last year. In the city, the Oregon grapes are preparing huge globes of yellow blooms. For butterflies, there are great opportunities for those among them who can wait out the cold, and most of our species are made to do just that, adapted far better for nature’s fits and starts than us supposedly “advanced” but rather whiny hu- mans. Consider the first instar fritillaries: what a time they’ll be havin’, beginning to creep across the moist earth to an emerging violet plant and chomping down. I look forward to larger numbers not only of Callippes and Zerenes, but also the little Bolorians as well. Schedule a mid June trip to one of the haunts frequented by a state species of concern, the Silver Bordered Frit. Your odds should be good. On the down side, a lengthy cool spring will interfere with some of our northbound migrants, I would guess. For Monarchs, I am concerned that some of our local milkweed spots have been watered to the point of drowning. Those Monarch adults that still manage to arrive here in May and June may have trouble locating their hosts, but where the plant still grows, it will be lush.

One additional word of caution for those of us – most of us, I think – who prefer primitive roads to pavement when looking for leps: know before you go, check with Forest Service, BLM and other land managers before heading alone or with your group into the bush. I know of several roads in our area that are not passable due to washouts. We read in today’s paper, for instance, that the Porcupine Bay camp area at Lake Roosevelt is closed for the season because a slide covered its access road. One access road to Hog Lake is out, having eroded into a new creek bed. No doubt there are more examples in your area. May the land enjoy the respite from us humans!

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