Calendar

Mon Sep 22 - Club Meeting: Enchanted Rock State Natural Area. Zilker Botanical Garden Center, 7:00pm. Lance Allred, Austin-based photographer, will discuss his book project on one of Texas' favorite parks, Enchanted Rock State Natural Area. The project covers the history, geology, weather, flora, fauna, and activities, with the goal of producing a comprehensive multi-disciplinary guide to the park. Join him as he discusses some of the ongoing research on its origins, and shows some of his image portfolio, including 55 butterfly species, 90 moths, flowers, damselflies and dragonflies, spiders, insects, mammals, and birds. See the Enchanted Rock web site for more information.

Sun Sep 28 - Field Trip: Wild-Connections Butterfly Farm from 9 am to noon. Val Bugh and Dan Hardy will be our leaders. Their normal $4 entrance fee will be waived for our field trip although we will pass the hat for those who want to make a donation. We'll look for butterflies, other insects, and birds in the butterfly farm's gardens and wild areas with flowers. We may stop at Dromgoole's Natural Gardener Nursery in Oak Hill (8648 Old Bee Cave Road) afterwards.

Wild-Connections is located off Highway 290 West just 9 minutes past the Y in Oak Hill.

Directions: Take Hwy 290 west towards Dripping Springs, turn left at Nutty Brown Rd. (at the traffic light soon after McCoys). Take the next left on Kit Carson - when it turns to the right, go straight into driveway of Wild-Connections. See their map at: http://www.wild-connections.com/contact/

Thursday to Sunday, October 16-19 - 13th Annual Texas Butterfly Festival in Mission, TX, located in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of South Texas. This highly successful event has field trips for all levels of knowledge, as well as lectures and vendors. The diversity and numbers of butterflies will overwhelm you. Highly recommended! www.texasbutterfly.com

Sunday to Thursday, October 19-23. El Cielo Butterfly Festival. What better way to follow up the Mission festival with a guided bus tour deep into northeast Mexico. Nearly 300 species were seen on last year's trip. This is a comfortable introduction to the marvelous butterflies of Mexico that leaves from McAllen, TX. See www.mexbirds.net for details.

Mon Oct 27 - Club Meeting: Arachnids of Texas and the World. Presentation by Dave Moellendorf (Austin Arachnological Services). Spider expert Dave Moellendorf will bring a zoo of charismatic arachnids from around the world, including a “bird-eating” spider from South America. He'll tell us about the natural history, behavior, and habitats of his animals. Dave is an expert on the tarantulas of Texas and will spend some time showing us our native tarantulas, telling us about them and his efforts to conserve them. Zilker Botanical Garden Center, 7:00pm.

Mon Nov 24 - Club Meeting: Member Show and Tell. Members can show slides of butterflies, ranging from those in the backyard to distant travels, or you can talk about your best butterfly experience of the year. We will have an LCD projector available so you only have to bring a CD or thumb drive. We also have a slide projector. You have 10 minutes. It's a fun way to wrap up the year, as the butterflies dwindle. If you want to participate, please contact Dan Hardy dhh787@yahoo.com. As usual the meeting is at:Zilker Botanical Garden Center, 7:00pm.

Thu Dec 4 - Christmas Potluck Dinner. Austin Butterfly Forum will provide the ham. We ask members to bring a dish. The dinner will be held at our usual meeting place, the Zilker Botanical Garden Center, starting at 6:30pm. If you have any questions, please contact our Refreshments Coordinator pegwallace@gmail.com. (Please note that the potluck is earlier in the month than our usual meeting time and that there is no other meeting in December.) See you there!