It’s no walk in the park when Tom Smith ’03 goes butterfly catching. Actually, it’s a slog through the mud. Donning an old pair of sneakers and pants, he wades into South Carolina’s freshwater marshes in pursuit of his quarry, slipping past sawgrass, snakes and alligators. He wears a backpack stuffed with glass jars and carries a butterfly net in his hand. He leaves his car parked on a dirt road. There’s no one around for miles, and the horseflies keep biting, taking away chunks of his skin. Blocking all this out of his mind, he continues on, intent on finding his target – the elusive wetland skipper.
As he says, in typical understatement, “You really have to go out of your way to find the species.”
Despite the difficulty in reaching the small, quick butterflies, Smith has had great success identifying the Southern habitats in which nine types of wetland skippers can be found. The fieldwork is part of his thesis research as a master’s of environmental sciences student at the College, and his findings will give natural scientists a wealth of information about a species that remains shrouded in some degree of mystery, mostly because the wetland skippers he studies prefer to live in either wooded wetlands or near river deltas – places in the Southeast not typically visited by humans.
They’re also remarkably fast. Even for Smith, a frequent visitor to the marshes and an adept butterfly catcher, there are a few skipper species that confound him. He’s found only a few Berry’s skippers, for example, and scientists still aren’t sure what these creatures eat.
This academic year, Smith is finishing writing his thesis under the advisement of biology professor Brian Scholtens, who can’t wait for him to wrap up. With the thesis out of the way, explains Scholtens, the men can start tackling their next project: a book on all the butterflies in South Carolina. But first, Smith must end his research of the skippers, which includes the construction of a GIS database on their locations throughout the Southeast.
Like many scientists, Smith enjoys fieldwork more than writing. His frequent forays into the forest and marshes have made him witness to some astounding natural displays, such as the territorial dominance exhibited by the small and fragile skippers. He’s watched males, perched on tall pieces of grass, intercept intruding skippers and identify them as friend or foe. Should the interloper be female, Smith says, the male will try to mate. Should the trespasser be male, the butterflies start combat.
“They have these aerial dogfights,” says Smith. “It’s pretty amazing to watch.”
Other times, he hasn’t lingered to observe the marsh’s wild animals, such as the time the large alligator near him suddenly submerged and he noticed a wake heading in his direction.
“At that point,” says the normally intrepid Smith, “I decided not to stick around.”
Retreating to land, he headed back to his car. He’d be back in the marsh soon enough, and thanks to his research, he knew just where to find plenty more skippers.
