0:13

"Just go up and down the riparian on either side. Okay, first one that catches a butterfly gets a milkshake!"

0:16

That's enough incentive for the dozen or so kids that are participating in this year's Metolius Basin portion of the annual Fourth of July Butterfly Count.

0:25

The chase is on! Look at 'em go!

0:28

They are not catching butterflies to collect them, but to count the number they find of each species. "One Morning Cloak! Okay!"

0:37

This month across most of America, as well as parts of Canada and Mexico, people are doing just what we're doing today. The purpose of the count is to provide butterfly population data to agencies like the Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management and universities.

0:56

There's changes in the Forest Service right now and they're looking at whole system management. And so they haven't really addressed any of the insects on this kind of scale before, only the pestiferous ones. And so they can take this kind of data and say, okay, here's the lepidoptera: here's the moths that the bats eat, or here's the butterflies that depend on these kind of plants and there's not that many of them, so we ought to set aside this area for this particular species. So that's information they can draw from one butterfly count one day a year.

1:30

There are several locations in Oregon that participate in the count. Sue Anderson is the leader of the Metolius Group.

1:41

"Ah, Milbert's tortoiseshell. And he's brand new, look at him! Look at the color, he's not faded yet, he's just emerged."

1:48

She has long admired what is perhaps our best-loved invertebrate. Lepidoptery, the study of butterflies and moths, has become a favorite pastime.

1:53

"I love it! It's educational. It's entertaining. It's a wonderful family project. See how he can camouflage so easily? When he lands he folds his wings up and you can't even see him against the tree bark."

2:10

Perhaps it's the legendary beauty of the butterfly that draws people to the count. Or maybe it's the joy of discovering the names, habits and extraordinary markings of creatures that usually only flutter by us for mere moments. Whatever it is, this event has been enchanting people of all ages at this event for almost 20 years.

2:33

"Dad, I caught a wood nymph!" "Oh, you did?" "I got something!" "Sue!" "What?" "I have a butterfly!"

2:40

"All right! Boy, she's beat up pretty bad. But this is a female. That's why she's brown on top instead of blue." "Oh, I see." "It's got a little orange on top right here so it's going to be an Acmon blue. Her wings are torn and it's not from Mary having caught her in the net. She's, ya know, they only live for a couple of weeks and she's probably been out a couple of weeks."

3:10

Lepidopterists say it's okay to catch and hold the butterfly just long enough to identify it.

3:16

"As long as you don't mess with their wings too much and you don't squeeze them too hard on the abdomen. If you squeeze 'em just a little bit too hard, it does 'em in."

3:20

While trying not to have too much impact on the butterflies herself, Sue does see signs of recent activity that could affect the invertebrate's population.

3:31

"Well, one thing we did notice is that they've been running a lot of sheep through this area right here and they've destroyed a lot of butterfly habitat. A lot of butterflies feed on grasses and the sheep just ate or trampled the grasses. A lot of the flowering plants that the butterflies nectar on were trampled under and that was a real disappointment."

3:50

The Sisters Ranger District says they plan to review sheep allotment on federal land and work with flock owners towards a more equitable arrangement between the two species. Organizations like the North American Butterfly Association and the Xerces Society hope so. The Xerces Society was the original sponsor of the nationwide count.

4:08

The Xerces Society was formed because some people were concerned about a little blue butterfly. Just a tiny, little, blue butterfly that existed only in one special habitat. And when its habitat was paved over, the butterfly was gone. And a lot of people can throw up their hands and say well, so what, you know, there are lots of other butterflies out there. Well, we've learned by past mistakes that when you destroy something out of its element, we may not think it has a reason to be there, but it always has a reason to be there.

4:40

Besides their pollination duties, butterflies are a critical part of the food chain. Now, believe it or not, caterpillars, butterfly, and moth larvae are the largest vegetation consumers in a forest! They eat more of the greenery than deer and other herbivores! But, in turn, 90 to 95 percent of these caterpillars are eaten by small predators like birds and squirrels. This makes them one of the largest food suppliers to small predators in the forest!

5:24

"Oh, two in one catch! He deserves a special award for that!" "He got three!" "I got three!"

5:31

"Three in one swipe! What's the yellow? Okay, this is a Nevallis copper first of all. This is a buckeye. We've never had a buckeye on our count before. Congratulations! Good job! The first one! Okay, you want to open it up and see what it looks like inside? Let me do it with my little finger." "My dad caught him!"

5:57

Along with delighting in the excitement of the chase, Sue believes the kids are learning respect for the tiniest of creatures.

6:04

Kids go out on the playground at school and if somebody else takes a butterfly and starts messing with it or steps on it or something like this, boy, they come down to fisticuffs! You can't do that with insects! "Okay, you caught her. Ben, you want to let her go? Lick your finger Ben and get the butterfly to walk right up on your finger and then he'll drink right up off your fingertip." "Sure."

6:31

"It's important to be in touch with what's going on in your environment. And counting butterflies is a fun and easy way to do this. And at the same time provides technical, scientific information that's valuable in research and in eco-planning. We can think of nothing we like to do better on a sunny Saturday than go out and chase butterflies all day long! It just feels great! That's it!" "Bye, bye!"