Austin, Texas, is home to about 170 species of butterflies. It is also the home of the Austin Butterfly Forum, Inc., a non-profit organization dedicated to butterfly conservation and to enriching people's lives through butterflies. The Austin Butterfly Forum is a club that organizes field trips, conducts butterfly counts, promotes native gardening, performs conservation activities, and meets monthly for an educational presentation. We are a community of butterfly enthusiasts who also enjoy dragonflies & damselflies, bees, beetles, spiders and arthropods in general, and our meeting presentations span this gamut as well. Join Us!

Predaceous diving beetle, photo by Mike Quinn

Meetings are held in the Zilker Garden Center, 2220 Barton Springs Rd., Austin, TX, 78746 at 7:00 PM on the fourth Monday of each month except December.

---

Sep. 26, 2016, meeting: Aquatic Invertebrates of Central Texas, presented by Peter Diaz.

Peter Diaz, Aquatic Biologist and Invertebrate Specialist, graduated from Texas State University with a B.S. in Aquatic Biology and in 2010 with an M.S. in Aquatic Resources. Peter's master thesis was on habitat associations and diet of the listed San Marcos salamander, which has recently been published in Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems. Since then he has been working at the Texas Fish and Wildlife Conservation Office in San Marcos Texas, with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. His body of work includes aquatic invertebrates in spring and stream ecosystems.

---

Oct. 24, 2016, meeting: Native Bees in Agricultural Landscapes, presented by Sarah Cusser.

"I’m a fourth year graduate student in the Evolution, Ecology, and Behavior department at the University of Texas in Austin. Advised by Dr. Shalene Jha, my research investigates the composition and movement of native bee communities in agricultural landscapes here in central Texas.

Currently, I’m looking at the pollinators of both peach and cotton crops to determine what affect agricultural development has had on the composition and movement of the bee community as well as the quality of pollination service provided.

My research hopes to inform land management decisions that best promote the conservation and restoration of these important insect communities. In the past, I've worked on habitat restoration projects in California, Vermont and Ohio and in agricultural systems in New Jersey and Pennsylvania."