Yesterday, while the real teams were racking up species for the World Series of Birding competition all over the state of New Jersey, I did an unofficial and informal photographic Big Day in Cape May. The World Series Teams (and we are talking hundreds of teams in this 29th run of the event) count all the bird species they can see or reliably hear between midnight and midnight on a Saturday each May. They collect pledges from friends and family (and the public at large) for each species they count, and the money goes to good conservation causes. The winners of the various divisions get bragging rights and a trophy. And everyone has a lot of fun.

I, on the other hand, spent the day trying to photograph as many bird species as I could. There used to be a photographic division, but it has lapsed. I too had a lot of fun. I only photographed 30 species or so, but I was not, honestly, trying as hard as I might, I did not get out until 8am and came back to process at 5, and I set myself a location limit of a “reasonable drive” from my hotel. Still, I had a lot of fun.

One of the places I visited was the Cape May National Wildlife Refuge. This is a kind of unknown refuge, made up a scattering of isolated parcels in South Jersey. They have built a headquarters on one of the parcels and a few trails on few more. I hiked the Songbird trail near the headquarters off Route 47 north of Rio Grande and south of Goshen.

As I was hiking, I came on what looked like a jet black butterfly. It was staying high in the trees and was constantly in motion so it was hard to see. I really hoped it would light so I could get a look at it, but it disappeared deeper into the tree line between my trail and the fields beyond. I hiked on.

The Songbird tail was billed as .6 mile loop, and it looked pretty straight forward on the map. It crossed the road by the headquarters and entered a stand of forest that belongs to the Nature Conservancy. In there it got kind of sketchy, with blue blazes on the trees and not much else. After hiking what seemed like a very long way without any sign that it was returning to my car, I turned around and headed back. I figured I could check the tree where the butterfly was on my way.

And it was there! I saw it in flight first again, but it settled on a branch just at eyelevel and I was able to study and photograph it to my heart’s content. It was new to me. Not really black, as you see from the photograph, but dark blue/purple with an electric blue trailing edge and red/orange spots on the fringe of the wings. It was a big butterfly…not quite Monarch size, but close. Spectacular!

Of course I had to look it up when I got back to the car. I had my Xoom Tablet with me with my Audubon Guides installed, and I found it fairly easily. Red-spotted Purple!

Back at the hotel, after processing the images, I was checking my identification and I kept finding images of the Red-spotted Purple in groups with the White Admiral. Finally I found a site that explained that the Red-spotted Purple and the White Admiral are two radically distinct forms of the same species. The species range is from the artic south across much of North America, with isolated populations in the mountains of the southwest deserts and even into Mexico, but the two forms are divided north/south along a line that follows the US/Canada boarder and splits New England. I live north of the line, where the White Admiral is the common form. New Jersey is, clearly, south of the line where the Red-spotted Purple predominates.

And just to confuse matters, there is a Black Admiral butterfly common over this whole range that is not part of the complex. White Admiral (Maine) and Black Admiral (Ohio) shown below.

Such a lot to learn! And such beautiful creatures.

And for the Sunday thought. I told this whole long story because it is a good example of what delights me most about birding and bugging and photography and life in general. If the Songbird trail had done as it was billed, I would have hiked on back to the car and never seen the “black” butterfly again. But it did not, and I did not, and I did! Even after turning around, the likelihood of seeing the butterfly a second time…and of its settling so I could photograph it…was marginal at best. Vanishingly small in the cosmic perspective. And yet I did, and it did, and I did.

I don’t believe in chance or coincidence. And I don’t believe in determinism, either mechanistic or divine…not even if you dress it up and call it fate. But I do believe in what might be called, for lack of a better word, cooperation. I believe in an intelligence in the universe that is expressed throughout what we call nature. I believe that intelligence is personal. We have, by grace, a relationship. I believe that intelligence is loving, and wants me to be both good and happy. And, finally, I believe that to be good and happy, all I need to do is cooperate. I need to do what that intelligent, loving person is doing…do my bit of what is, in a cosmic sense, happening. I don’t have to. There is no compulsion. But when I do, I feel good (and this is case where that is grammatically correct), and I am happy.

So, following my feelings that the trail was too long and too vague, I turned around. The Red-spotted Purple was waiting. That is cooperation, not coincidence in my universe! All I can say is thank you.

And get a load of the white racing strips on the head parts!