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Marine blue (Leptotes marina)        Images © Mark A. Chappell

These little butterflies -- I'm pretty sure they are marine blues -- are extremely common in the eastern Sierra Nevada, where the adults feed on a variety of flowers.   These are mainly on buckwheat (Eriogonum).   Like many butterflies, they usually perch with the wings tightly folded, making it difficult to get an image of the upper wing surface.   I took these pictures with a macro lens and on-camera flash along Convict Creek, Mono County, California.   This page shows the similar Sierra blue, which was common in the same habitat.

  • Canon 30D, 100 mm f2.8 macro lens, fill-in flash (2005)