Hi Paul,

The white spot on the inside of the antennal club says sinapis to me, whereas duponcheli is brown at this point. Maybe worth another look?

Roger

Good to see you got graeca at last, Jim! You and I had no joy at Lombarde, not for graeca or anything else, for that matter. I did get to see one or two in mid-July at Madone de Fenestre but only in flight as they never settled within my eyesight. Gordolasque is a rich area as you have found. I went...

Hi Jim, The Claree valley was once an allegedly good location for Pieris ergane and Euphydryas intermedia. I went there several times, but not recently, and went to the end of the "interesting" road, stopping off at Le Jadis. I did not find either species but I did find several hundred she...

I agree armoricanus. It's not nailed-on but on the balance of probabilities it is a strong favourite. And according to Lafranchis, it flies in most of the Lot, so one reason for precluding it has been removed.

Roger

Small Heath is a common and very variable species within the southern département (county) of Var in France. This is my page: http://www.butterfliesoffrance.com/html/Coenonympha%20pamphilus.htm The ocelli are very variable, the colour is very variable, and even the wing shape can vary. Lyllus flies ...

From the undersides I could see, I thought they were all serratulae.

Roger

I suggested the "window" clue only in respect of baeticus and lavatherae , mainly because Pete suggested that these were the two options based on his observations in the field. I think this clue only holds true for lavatherae as compared to both baeticus and alceae . The discussion about t...

Hi Pete, Sounds like a great trip. 12 (13) life ticks is a terrific return for a week's trip. They get harder! I'll express an opinion on your putative baeticus : with that degree of wear, it is almost impossible to say for sure as baeticus and lavatherae would/could look very similar. But I would l...

I would be very wary of drawing conclusions from a slight variation in one of the upperside markings. And in the case of cirsii , even from the underside colouring, although if it is clearly reddish this strongly points to cirsii , but the colouring is also quite variable. Here are a selection of ci...

If I saw this in France, there wouldn't be much doubt - cirsii . But there may be other Pyrgus in the location where you were and cinarae is stated to occur in the Montes Universales and the Tolman image does look very similar. The only clue I could suggest is that the cirsii cell spot is usually wi...

Wouldn't the forewing margins normally be blank or at least less marked if it were dorylas ? I say normally as I have seen dorylas with marginal markings but not in s6. It appears to be a male from what little we can see of the end of the abdomen. Based on the hindwing colour, I would tend to rule o...

This is the third of three posts. It is the last two weeks in July, from the Mercantour back to the UK via eastern France. First up is an increasingly popular spot in the Mercantour, heaving with butterflies in mid-July. I counted 46 species in one day and I’m sure there were many more I missed. Thi...

It's still better than the Col d'Allos which is to the west, one of two roads my missus steadfastly refuses to go over. And she happily (relatively speaking) does Bonnette but only from the south. The other is the Col de Sarennes. Mind you she hasn't done the Col des Champs from the west side or Gal...

Agreed. I'd be amazed if it was anything else.

Roger

Posting 2 of 3: Small Blue ( Cupido minimus ) is a very hardy species, often being found at very high altitudes. I see large numbers of males at times, but females only rarely as it the case with most high altitude Blues. This was one occasion where a female (on the right) posed nicely for the camer...

Here are some images from my travels this year. They are in chronological order and this is the first of three postings. Always an early emerger, its flight period is almost over by mid-April, Provence hairstreak ( Tomares ballus ). Tomares ballus_45903.JPG There are both Festoons in the region wher...

We await a response from David. Did it just look different or did it act differently? If the former, then in what respect? Today I saw aethiopella with two small blind ocelli. For me, unless it was flying up and down rocky scree, it isn't gorge . The fact that David could get a photo strongly sugges...

I wouldn't rule out aethiopella . The single blind ocellus would be a unusual, but the ocelli are normally very small and have very small white centres, so this is not that far off the scale. Otherwise, the forewing markings look as I would expect for aethiopella . In terms of circumstantial evidenc...

Well spotted, Guy. As the upperside doesn't belong to the underside, it's a whole new game. I had just assumed that they did. Given that they are different individuals, I agree that the upperside is highly likely female carthami . The underside looks most likely alveus (of which accretus is a subspe...

I'm currently in the Pyrenees, but accretus looks most likley to me. I can see good reasons to preclude anything else, and it does look right for accretus . So little is known about accretus and there seem to be very few reliable reference photos even of males, so, given that this is a female, we ar...