Massachusetts Butterfly Club

The Fall meeting of the Massachusetts Butterfly Club was held at Mass Audubon's Broad Meadow Brook in Worcester on Saturday, October 12th. Thanks to Martha Gach and Massachusetts Audubon for allowing us to use the BMB facility. It's a great place for our meetings. Thirty members and guests joined us in-person. A few others had hoped to join us on Zoom but the "technical issues" gremlins won the battle this day. Even our IT guru (Dave Small) could not overcome their evil power.

The food was great! Special thanks go to Bill Benner and Joe Wicinski for bringing two main courses, dessert and drinks. It is hard to imagine a better pot-luck selection of appetizers, entrees and desserts.

The potluck dinner was followed by our brief business meeting. Elise Barry gave the treasurer's report (we have money) and Barbara Volkle gave a membership report (we have members). Danielle Desmarais gave a report on her Hessel's Hairstreak project, and is looking for continued participation for the coming season.

We also had our Biennial Election of Club Officers.
The election results (by unanimous vote):
      President - Peter Loshin
      Vice President (East) - Kristin Steinmetz
      Vice President (West) - Carol Duke
      Treasurer - Joe Wicinski
      Secretary - Barbara Volkle
We thank Tom Tyning for his leadship during his brief term as President. Thanks also to Martha Gach for her work as VP of the East and as President in the prior term. She is relocating to Maine. Special thanks go to Elise Barry who has done an excellent job of handling the treasurer duties of the club since 2009. Welcome to our new officers who have big shoes (figuratively) to fill.

Our guest speaker was Jake McCumber, Natural Resources & Training Lands Manager, Massachusetts Army National Guard, who presented "Butterflies of the Barrens: Lepidoptera Conservation at Camp Edwards". Jake McCumber is the Natural Resources & Training Lands Manager for the Massachusetts Army National Guard (MAARNG). He specializes in conservation planning,

endangered species management, pine barrens ecology, and landscape scale restoration. Jake and his MAARNG conservation team restore and manage healthy pine barrens and sandplain habitats at Camp Edwards and support the unique species communities within them, including some excellent butterflies.

Wildlife of particular interest for him include moths, butterflies, birds, and tiger beetles and he is an avid hiker and naturalist. He lives in Falmouth with his family where he is active in scouting and the outdoors.
Unfortunately, the gremlins also ate the recording of the presentation. We hope to have a re-do of the presentation and if that happens, we will post a link here to see it.

The presentation was followed by our always popular member photograph show included pictures taken by Peter Loshin, Garry Kessler and Tom Tyning.

Many thanks to all who brought food and helped with set-up and clean up.

Special thanks to Dave Small. Without his technical support, the presentation and member pictures would not be possible.

Below are a few photographs taken at the meeting.

Mouse over photo to see captions. Click on photo to see larger image.