Only to show the forewings was rather sneaky (shame on me). My main reason for showing the two together was to compare the size. One more clue - the images were taken at just over 2000m. The camera angle shows a slight sheen which didn't seem to be apparent in the field. Here are the two shown separ...

Another pair.

IDs anyone? Roger

Due to a shortage of leaves, we now have to share. Roger

Hi Andy, The orange band is one of those clues where if the band is strong orange right up to the costa, then it is very likely (maybe almost certainly) Reverdin's, but it is quite possible for Reverdin's to have less than convincing orange bands. Yours certainly extends to the costa, but doesn't lo...

Looks like the underside trumps the upperside! I think this re-writes the rule-book on the range of the strength of markings for serratulae . The unh marks (especially basal s7, discal s1, discal s4/5, marginal s2) looked exactly right for serratulae, just the upperside that created any doubt. The m...

Good question, Bert-Jan! This is clearly carthami on the upperside and serratulae on the underside, if nature should permit that to be possible. :D This is one of those individuals that just does not fit the accepted ID features. There are very good reasons why it cannot be either of them but it has...

Yes, a great read, Pete, thanks for sharing. It seems like you could have got the first four lifers in a day trip. I had a similar but more explicable experience in a hotel in the Champsaur a few years back. It was a huge hotel and I was the only person staying there. That was, until midnight when t...

I'd be happy to win the bet, especially as I would be 107.

Not sure I thought that through....

Roger

Padfield wrote: ↑Fri Feb 16, 2024 6:15 pm Today was the first day of the second sixty years of my life.Yes - my 60th birthday. Weird - I don't feel any different from when I was 30!

Happy birthday, Guy.

I would have a small wager that you will say the same thing when you hit 90.

Roger

I have looked in detail at my photos of dia and selene and, although I have some selene with a “degree” of angularity i.e. some sort of angle, I don’t have any that have the sharp angularity of this one. Well spotted bugboy! I think it is almost certainly dia . I have said that but left it on my sel...

Surmising somewhat, given that we don’t know the thought processes that led these two experts to conclude selene without qualification, but I would think that they went unequivocally for selene largely on the grounds that there was no chance dia flew there and that the ups was within range for selen...

No specific reason cited, Pete, which maybe suggests closer to 100-0 rather than 60-40. Although I told them the location, they didn't say that, given the location, it must be xyz. One did comment that the difference between males and females was much more marked for selene than for dia . This seems...

Well… I have had responses from two of the local experts and both opined unequivocally that it is a female selene . The question was framed in an open way (i.e. not “do you agree that…”) and neither offered the possibility that it might be dia , which I did ask. Given their expertise and detailed lo...

I have asked the local experts, the authors of this book: http://www.naturedugard.org/doc/2022_commande_papillons_de_france.pdf I asked them – can selene look like this? – can dia fly at the Col de Finiels? I am also aware that the thread is for favourite photo of 2023 and this is somewhat off-topic...

Sometimes experience can lead to the wrong answer because experience means that not enough thought is given. Please feel free to question, bugboy, it's the basis of good science. Some years ago I saw a blue at Digne-les-Bains in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence and confidently ID’d it as Idas. I didn’t t...

Good point, David! Have I been guilty of assuming an ID just because of where I saw it? Easy trap to fall into. Is it selene (Small Pearl-bordered) or dia (Weaver’s/Violet)? Weighing the evidence: I have (in Var) seen dia that look almost exactly like this one. Most look at least similar. In Provenc...

Not a species I see very often, so this heavily marked female was a nice surprise, seen in central France.
Roger

The one showing its underside nicely must be a choice between serratulae and carthami (unless I’m missing something) and although I quite like the underside for carthami I can’t make the upperside hind wing work at all so would settle on serratulae as the least worst option. I agree serratulae as t...

A species for which I rarely get a good photo opportunity, but after several hours of heavily overcast weather in the Pyrenees, I went for a stroll and this male was making the most of what little sunlight there was.

By coincidence, I mentioned Nabokov's obsession with butterflies (in this instance, in America) to someone on Monday, who clearly wondered if I was pulling their leg. It put me in mind of this article: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1948/06/12/butterflies-vladimir-nabokov Recognise the location?...