Great Spangled Fritillary

This baby (Speyeria cybele) stopped me in my tracks. Never saw this butterfly before, although it is said to be common in the central U.S. Elbowed through waist-high grass to get photos and video, earning me 60 chigger bites, welts from knees to armpits; the itching was cured only with applications to the skin of diluted laundry bleach (1 part bleach to 7 parts water). That was Reeve's advice. It worked. The butterfly was worth it.

Fascinatingly, the Great Spangled Fritillary's scalloped wings look different on each side: dorsal side brown with orange and yellow, pretty but nothing special (see small photo); the contrasting ventral side is silver spots on coffee-and-cream. No fabric like this has ever been woven by man. Prefers to drink from purplish flowers, and I caught this one on horsemint and, in a separate series of photos, also on coneflowers. Difficult to ID, but this website helped me and maybe you can use it too. The Great Spangled Fritillary: I couldn't have named it better. What's a fritillary? A butterfly with tiny front legs that have no claws. Everybody else's front legs have claws. If the photos are greatly enlarged it can be seen that their front legs aren't good for clinging to anything.