Northern Crescent - Phyciodes cocyta

Fun with Crescents

I agree the pattern is a better match for Northern (P. cocyta). As well, the antennal clubs have orange on them, also a good mark for Northern (Pearl [P. tharos] should have black and white clubs in the East [see this]). The USGS site shows two MA counties with records for Northern, so it may not be out of range for you. The flight date for Northern in Canada is apparently mid-June to mid-July though, with Pearl flying earlier, which is not so good for this being Northern.

However, crescent taxonomy seems to be in a confused state currently. See this page for a phylogeny based on mtDNA which suggests something funny is going on with Pearl, Northern, Tawny (P. batesii), and Field (P. pulchella) Crescents. As well, there are other taxa within this group that may be full species as well, although I forget which these are proposed to be. So, while I think this could be a Northern under current nomenclature, it could be something else as well, once the taxonomic dust has settled for this group.

Just to make crescents even more fun, their scientific names are confused too. Northern is sometimes referred to as P. selenis, and Field as P. pratensis or P. campestris. Opler and Warren's list of North American butterflies (online as a pdf here) seems to be the most up-to-date source and uses P. cocyta and P. pulchella respectively.

… Joel Kits, 13 January, 2005 - 7:44pm

about the "page"

Regarding the publication refered to above, I thought I'd add an observation, that certain of the specimens (which you can look at photos of) are questionable as to correct identification. If you arrange the (photos of) specimens according to how they came out in the molecular phylogeny, all but a few specimens group neatly and consistently into "look-alike" groups and the results become much less random looking. The few that "look" different from their "matches" probably simply represent minor color variations that can and do cause confusion, but other explanations (such as hybridization) could be involved too. So, the phylogeny (in my opinion) does quite nicely at identifying the specimens used! This goes back to the confusion (and disagreement) found in separating individuals of P. batesii, P. cocyta, and P. tharos (and a fourth type that seems to be in the northern Prairies region).

… David J. Ferguson, 18 July, 2008 - 8:36am

Northern...

Hey Joel,

Thanks for all of this info, it is really interesting and it seems like there is a lot of work to be done in this genus. I'll go ahead and move it to P. cocyta for now until we hear otherwise:)

… Tony DiTerlizzi, 27 July, 2005 - 6:14am