Bootleggers and Butterflies

There was an article in the Kitchener-Waterloo Record yesterday about the role that local brewers and distillers played during the Prohibition Era in the U.S..  It was an interesting read and shed light on Seagrams Distillery and the bootlegging of beer and whisky between Waterloo and Windsor/Amherstburg, then across the border.

Some of the remaining Seagrams buildings in Waterloo have been re-purposed as swanky loft apartments and think-tanks, but there's also a site between Kitchener and Guelph which was once home to their warehouse facility.  Today it's just cracked pavement, a reservoir which was built for fire suppression and a whole lot of old field meadow.

In 2010, the year I took the photos below, it seemed at though you couldn't walk 100m without spotting a Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta).  Nettles are the host plant for this species  (Urtica spp., Laportea canadensis).  This aggressive and territorial butterfly is widespread and also occurs in Europe and Asia.

Another species, Viceroy (Limenitis archippus) feeds on willow (Salix spp.) and poplar (Populus spp.).  This butterfly is often confused with Monarch (Danaus plexippus) but is smaller and has a distinct black line running across the forewing and hindwing.  There are arguments that the appearance of Viceroy has evolved to mimic Monarch, an unpalatable species (Batesian mimicry), and there are also arguments that Viceroy itself is unpalatable to predators through sequestering acids derived from willows and poplars (Müllerian mimicry).