Milestones

1967: A Toronto branch of the Michigan Entomological Society is founded by 4 people from the Royal Ontario Museum.

1969: The Toronto Entomologists' Association (TEA) becomes an independent organization and welcomes members throughout Ontario.

1979: We become a member group of Ontario Nature, which is an umbrella organization for naturalists’ groups in Ontario.

1970: The TEA publishes its first annual seasonal summary of butterfly and moth records from across Ontario. The series has been continued right up to the present day, and is now called Ontario Lepidoptera.

1991: With $24,000 of funding from the Ontario government and several foundations and charities, we publish 1,000 copies of a 165-page book, The Ontario Butterfly Atlas. Using data from the seasonal summaries, the book shows distribution maps for each species. To manage the flurry of activity around the Atlas, the TEA creates a Board of Directors.

1992: The TEA sponsors its first butterfly count in the Rouge River and Don River valleys in eastern Toronto, under the direction of Tom Mason of the Toronto Zoo and following the format promoted by the North American Butterfly Association (NABA). In 2009 there were 29 such counts across Ontario sponsored by various groups, and TEA members were involved in very many of them.

1993: The TEA welcomes its 100th member.

1994: We hold our first Student Symposium, which is now the March meeting of every year. Since 2000, one of the presenters at the Symposium receives the $300 Eberlie award for research travel, which is named in honour of TEA past president John Eberlie.

1995: We publish the first regular edition of Ontario Insects, our three-times-per-year 16-page magazine.

1995: The popular butterfly count idea is extended to dragonflies and damselflies , as Colin Jones organizes a Highway 60 Algonquin Odonata Count. There were 7 such counts in 2009.

1996: The TEA becomes a registered charity, which allows us to issue tax receipts for donations. Our charitable goals are insect education, insect research and insect conservation.

2000: The TEA publishes the first volume of Ontario Odonata, our seasonal summary of records of dragonflies and damselflies from across Ontario.

2001: The TEA starts a website under the domain name www.ontarioinsects.org.

2010: Our magazine Ontario Insects begins to publish in full colour.

For a personal account of T.E.A. history and conservation efforts, see the article by Alan Hanks. There is also an account of T.EA. activities in the 1970s from the Ontario Naturalist.

Presidents of the T.E.A.

• J. C. E. Riotte, 1969-1970. Rev. Riotte was a Research Associate with the Department of Entomology of the ROM until he left to join the Bishop Museum in Hawaii in 1975.
• Ron Michaels, 1970-1973
• A. Gordon Edmund, 1973-1977
• Paul Catling, 1977-1978
• Doug Scovell, 1978-1983
• W. J. D. (John) Eberlie, 1983-1990
• Quimby Hess, 1990-1992
• Phil Schappert, 1992-1996
• Duncan Robertson, 1996-1998
  
• Nancy van der Poorten, 1998-2004
• Glenn Richardson, 2004-present (2010)

TEA Vice-Presidents

• Paul Catling and William Edmonds, 1972-73
• J. C. E. Riotte, 1974-75
• Doug Scovell, 1977-78
• Alan Brown, 1978-80
• Jim Troubridge, 1980-81
• Quimby Hess, 1983-90
• Phil Schappert, 1990-92
• Duncan Robertson, 1992-96
• Tony Homes, 1996-98
• Jim Spottiswood, 1999-2004
• Clewdd Burns, 2005
• Alan Macnaughton, 2006-present (2010)

TEA Treasurers

• Alan Hanks, 1974-2006
• Chris Rickard, 2006-present (2010)

TEA Recording Secretaries

• Quimby Hess, 1974-78
• Alan Hanks, 1978-80
• Christopher Mettrick, 1981-82
• Mel Tintpulver, 1983-86
• Phil Schappert, 1990-92
• Nancy van der Poorten, 1992-98
• Paul McGaw, 1999
• Nancy van der Poorten, 2000-04
• Alan Macnaughton, 2005-06

Editors of Ontario Lepidoptera (seasonal summaries)

• 1969: Paul Catling and Cecil H. Walker
• 1970: Paul Catling, W. (Bill) Edmonds and Cecil H. Walker (butterflies), Ron Michaels and J. C. E. Riotte (moths)
• 1971: Paul Catling and Cecil H. Walker
• 1972-74: Quimby Hess
• 1975: Quimby Hess and Alan Hanks
• 1976: Quimby Hess, Walter Plath and Alan Hanks
• 1977: Quimby Hess and Alan Hanks
• 1978-91: Quimby Hess
• 1992-2000: Alan Hanks
• 2001: Alan Hanks (butterflies) and Jeffrey Crolla (moths)
• 2002: Colin Jones (butterflies) and Jeffrey Crolla (moths)
• 2003-04: Colin Jones
• 2005: Colin Jones and Ross Layberry
• 2006-latest (2008): Ross Layberry and Colin Jones

Editors of Ontario Odonata (seasonal summaries)

• 1999-latest (2006): Paul Catling, Colin Jones and Paul Pratt

Editors of Ontario Insects

• 1995-1996: Phil and Pat Schappert (This replaced the 1-3 page minutes of each TEA meeting which Alan Hanks produced from 1969 to 1994).
• 1997-1998: Phil Lester and Matt Holder
• 1998-2000: Vanessa Carney
• 2000-2005: Colin Jones
• 2006-latest (2010): Glenn Richardson

History of Our Conservation Efforts

One thing that has become apparent to the membership through the T.E.A. summaries is that there are several butterfly species in Ontario that appear to have low numbers of reports. The Association has been particularly involved with three species -- the West Virginia White, the Frosted Elfin and the Karner Blue.

In 1970 the only known locality for the West Virginia White, in the Halton County Forest, was under threat of quarrying by the Aggregate Producers Association of Ontario. A letter was sent by Paul Catling to the Dept. of Lands & Forests in Toronto apprising them of the situation and the potential quarrying operation was halted. In 1974, another letter was sent to the Ministry of Natural Resources (M.N.R.) requesting the butterfly be protected under the Endangered Species Act and in 1975, a publication was produced on the butterfly with all relevant data. In 1976, the butterfly was listed as an endangered species. Then, in 1977, a new Hydro corridor was proposed to pass through the Halton Co. Forest and letters were sent to the Ontario Hydro Chairman and the M.N.R. A task force was set up within Ontario Hydro and in 1978, the proposed corridor was diverted around the area of concern.

Later, in 1979, a colony of the butterfly was discovered in Frontenac County north of Kingston, followed by colonies being found in Elgin County near London and a location near Sault Ste. Marie. The butterfly was later taken off the Endangered list and some aggregate development has occurred at the original site with tree-cutting and other damage.

The Karner Blue and Frosted Elfin, both reliant on Wild Lupine, comprise another sad story, with two sites in Essex County and the Pinery at Grand Bend in Huron County being the only known locations in Ontario. Considerable work was carried out by the T.E.A. on both species, with reports appearing in our annual summaries and field studies carried out by many of the members. In 1979, the Karner Blue was nominated as a threatened species in the United States and the T.E.A. was writing letters to the M.N.R. Problems at the Pinery site included development and the advent of all-terrain vehicles tearing up the dune habitat where the wild lupine thrived.

Management plans were created for both sites and lupine seed collection and re-planting were attempted. At the Pinery, the deer population suddenly started to flourish, and deer were not kept out of the Karner Blue areas. Since deer consume everything green within their reach, even the few lupine patches eventually disappeared. The M.N.R. placed both the Karner Blue and Frosted Elfin on the Endangered list in 1990, but it was too late to do anything. Both of these species were believed to be extinct in Ontario by that time. Now, in 2010, consideration is being given to re-introducing the Karner Blue to Ontario.

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