Kohler-Andrae, 2023, Day 1-ish.

As promised, I drove up to Kohler-Andrae State Park yesterday afternoon to camp with Anne and her extended family, and after we got the tents and clotheslines all set up, the grandson and I went to go see what we could see.

We had hardly gotten a hundred yards from our campsite when we came across the very first eyed brown butterfly (Satyrodes eurydice eurydice) I have ever seen. Now that’s what I call a good start.

In the cattail marsh along the Black River, we saw a few marsh wrens and heard a few soras, but then it was time to return to camp for supper, and I didn’t wait too long after that to call it a night. The good news is that an early bedtime and sleeping on the ground make it easy to get up early, so I went for a walk and got to see the sun rise over Lake Michigan.

After trying to take pictures of a pair of deer while it was still way too dark and watching a quartet of four nervous deer prancing over a ridge, I came across this very curious solo deer who let me take 20 pictures, as it circled around me into the nice morning light.

Then it tried its best to get a good whiff of my cologne, which happened to be eau de bug-spray this morning.

I finally wished the deer well and continued on my way, but I didn’t get very far before I could not believe my luck to come upon this sight: my first Kohler-Andrae coyote!

The coyote was on a mission and wasn’t visible for more than 30 seconds, but either it or I had earned the attention of this buck in the distance.

The sun was warming up a beautiful morning, and here’s one of many monarch butterflies taking advantage of it.

As I hiked down the road from the north end of the park back toward the campground, a doe with her fawn came out to take a look.

Then the fawn must have thought, “well, since I’m here, I might as well check on breakfast.”

I eventually waved goodbye to those two, as well, and continued back toward the campsite. Along the way, I finally caught a glimpse of one of my other favorite masked bandits, the common yellowthroat.

Meanwhile, a big flock of white pelicans circled above the Black River to the west.

Here’s a closer look.

Finally, here’s another monarch butterfly glowing in the morning sun …. or is it?

Nope. The keen entomologists will recognize it as my very first viceroy butterfly (Limenitis archippus), which I read “was long thought to be a Batesian mimic of the monarch butterfly, but since the viceroy is also distasteful to predators, it is now considered a Müllerian mimic instead.” Cool, right?!?! Oh, and for the anthophiles out there, it’s sipping nectar from purple Joe-Pye weed (Eutrochium purpureum).

Not a bad start to a week of camping, eh? Not a bad start at all.