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Daily short takes from an Appalachian hollow

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little wood satyr

July 13, 2025 by Dave Bonta

Another warm and humid morning. A brown butterfly lands on my book and closes its wings to show a row of eyespots: Little Wood Satyr. In the deep shade next to the springhouse, a twig snaps under a paw or hoof.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags little wood satyr, springhouse
May 29, 2016 by Dave Bonta

Exotic dancers of the Lepidoptera have names like Little Wood Satyr and Pearl Crescent. Their underwings bear black suns and crescent moons.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags little wood satyr, pearl crescent
May 24, 2015 by Dave Bonta

The white porch railing is a landing-strip for butterflies: red-spotted purple, little wood satyr. A fat contrail lingers above the ridge.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags contrails, little wood satyr, red-spotted purple 2 Comments
May 31, 2013 by Dave Bonta

Two wood satyr butterflies careen through the yard, the dark pages of their wings marked with yellow Os. A blue dragonfly circles the house.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags dragonflies, little wood satyr 2 Comments
July 16, 2010 by Dave Bonta

A little wood satyr—brown butterfly with yellow-rimmed eyespots—lands on the glass door and pivots at the center of its reflection.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags little wood satyr 2 Comments
July 8, 2008 by Dave Bonta

The little wood satyr I first spotted yesterday flutters up from the side garden, yellow-rimmed eyespots like dim headlights in the fog.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags fog, garden, little wood satyr

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On This Day

  • December 23, 2024
    Deep cold, with hoarfrost silvering every twig and dead weed. The sun clears the ridge and spreads glitter among the icicles. A white-breasted nuthatch begins…
  • December 23, 2023
    Silhouetted against the dawn sky, a squirrel forages for birch seeds right where Venus was last seen, glimmering through thin clouds.
  • December 23, 2022
    Back after a 10-day absence, I watch a front move in: blowing curtains of white. It’s as if winter had been waiting for me. Juncos…
  • December 23, 2021
    Overcast and cold. A chickadee foraging at the woods’ edge sings his fee-bee song. A sudden scrabbling of squirrel claws on locust bark.
  • December 23, 2020
    Out before sunrise, I watch the sky on the weather app switch from black to blue in less than a heartbeat. Then the slow blood-reddening…

See all...

Related book

Cover of Ice Mountain with a linocut of a big ridgetop tree.

What I do after I sit on the porch. One winter and spring's daily walks distilled into short poems with linocut illustrations by Beth Adams.

Header image: detail from Paper Garden by Clive Hicks-Jenkins (used by permission)

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