Greenwings: French Alps - 27 June to 8 July 2015

[David M]

Another Greenwings trip to the Parc du Mercantour (though once my work there was finished, I had five days independent travelling which took me into the Queyras).

I'm still trying to determine the exact number of species seen, so any help with IDs would be most welcome!!

I'm currently sitting on 123, which is some going, and perhaps not surprising given the weather conditions. The canicule (heatwave) in France had just started when I arrived and is probably still going strong, with temperatures reaching 39c at one point near Barcelonnette, and routinely into the mid-twenties even at altitudes of 2,200m+.

As ever, the views were beyond spectacular:

[Padfield]

Nice timing, David! I'm looking forward to seeing your 123 species. With a number like that, there must be some goodies among them!

Guy

[David M]

There are quite a few 'lifers', Guy, along with several more species that are highly notable.

I'll start with the aristocrat section of the nymphalids.

These aren't particularly common in this area of France, with Peacocks again notable by their absence.

A handful of Small Tortoiseshells, Red Admirals, Painted Ladies and Commas were seen, along with a solitary Large Tortoiseshell nectaring from the flowers of a sweet chestnut tree. Sadly, this latter specimen was only truly identifiable through binoculars so there are no images.

However, one of the true highlights of the trip was finally getting to see the elusive Southern Comma.

Roger had remarked that he'd seen one when out surveying the forest track at our first hotel on the morning of our arrival. To everyone's delight, it was still basking on the rock faces at half past five:

None of the group saw it again, but to my great delight, on my final afternoon I got a second audience when I arrived back at the top of the same forest track and couldn't help but notice the huge array of butterflies avidly nectaring from a large lavender bush in a resident's garden.

It seemed quite incongruous for such a rare butterfly to be sat happily amongst several much commoner species sipping away at the nectar source. I kind of wished that the owner would have come out to ask why I was stood taking photographs for quarter of an hour in such a public spot. Here's the lavender in question (along with its multitude of visitors):

And here's the very tame Southern Comma behaving as if it's a perfectly common insect:

[Chris Jackson]

That's a great start, David, and some fantastic scenery.
Cheers, Chris

[David M]

Cheers, Chris.

I kept an eye out for Black Satyr but didn't spot any so well done on seeing this species recently.

Two other notable aristocrats were encountered, the first being the 'spot' of the holiday.

One of the drivers came down from his room shortly after arriving at the second hotel to tell the rest of us that there was a large, purple butterfly perched on a mature tree at the back of the hotel. We made our way up there and could just about identify it as a Lesser Purple Emperor.

After all the guests had gone back, I spent the late afternoon of the Saturday at the same hotel and managed to find the Emperor using an ash tree to survey his realm:

Last year, I was the only member of the group to miss out on the solitary Poplar Admiral seen. This time though, when I saw what I first thought was a Great Banded Grayling in a poplar tree, I paid a great deal of attention. The insect never came down to earth, but it is clearly that most majestic of the Nymphalids:

Other species seen in this family included White Admiral, which has very sketchy distribution in SE France, along with the more widespread (but still not exactly common) Southern White Admiral. I saw four or five of the latter, including this beauty which was flying dangerously close to the Lesser Purple Emperor's territory:

[NickMorgan]

Wow, David. 123 species. That is more than I have seen in my life!! I am looking forward to reading about all that you saw.

[Roger Gibbons]

The heatwave is still going strong, David. 37C yesterday in Nimes and still 36C at 7pm. The only butterflies I saw were seeking shade.

Roger

[David M]

No heatwave in Wales, Roger We're back to 19c with wind, rain & cloud.

Hesperiidae

A good assortment of Skippers seen, with Large, Small, Essex, Lulworth and even a couple of early Silver-Spotted on the wing.

A handful of impressive, muscular Tufted Marbled Skippers cropped up too. These are the Purple Emperors of the Hesperiid world, robustly attacking anything that enters their air-space:

Marbled Skippers were about as well:

Amazingly, however, I didn't see a single Mallow Skipper during the trip, which is quite unusual as they are usually the commonest of carcharodus family.

Pyrgus

Without Roger being on hand, I'd be struggling to identify most of the pyrgus family. I'm now familiar with Safflower Skipper, which was again the most abundant in this group, and of course I know our own Grizzled Skipper well enough to identify malvoides (though they were a lot more scarce than last year).

With Roger's assistance, I also observed Large Grizzled Skipper, Dusky Grizzled Skipper, Carline Skipper and Olive Skipper, whilst a few Red Underwing Skippers were also seen in various locations.

Here are a couple of puddling images with different species of pyrgus to the fore:

[Willrow]

Great to know your trip went well David, superb scenery and a tally of 123 species...wow

Don't really want to mention our own heatwave here in Wales while you were working in sweltering France I look forward to reading more about your work

BW's

Bill

"When in doubt - venture out"

[David M]

Don't really want to mention our own heatwave here in Wales while you were working in sweltering France

Yes, I heard about it, Bill. Lasted 3 days and got up to 24c?

Do you know if it's coming back any time soon?

[Chris Jackson]

Good luck with the skipper IDs, David.
123 species is a lot to sort out. When I have less than 10 uncertainties in hand, I consider myself submerged
Great Southern Comma, another one on my wishlist.
Cheers, Chris

[David M]

You're right about the IDs, Chris. I've spent hours poring over the images and there are still a few I'm unsure about. C'est la vie!

Coppers, Hairstreaks and Bronzes

As expected, all the Coppers were seen in decent numbers, with Small Copper being the rarest with no more than 20 observed.

Few European insects are more attractive than Scarce Copper:

Purple-Edged Coppers are only marginally less attractive. Here's a male:

...and a female:

Several Sooty and Purple Shot Coppers were also seen, as were Ilex and Purple Hairstreaks.

More Sloe Hairstreaks were about than last year, with a few looking in decent nick:

My favourite though has to be the impeccably marked Blue Spot Hairstreak, and I considered myself most fortunate to stumble upon a mating pair:

Only one Geranium Bronze was seen during the group holiday, which I missed as I was in my room at the time. However, I saw another at Nice airport on the decorative pelargoniums and on my final evening a further individual showed up on the geraniums in the pot plants of the auberge in which I was staying:

[David M]

Fritillaries

Where do I start? A vast array of Frits were seen both small and large and although there were times when people became anxious due to being unable to photograph the fast-flying medium species, I reassured everyone that their chance would come at the thistle patch behind the second hotel, which is fast becoming an iconic location:

This hotspot not only attracts Fritillaries of many varieties; it's also a place where they stay relatively still, meaning that one needs only to exercise a little patience to reap rewards.

Dark Green Fritillary is possibly the commonest visitor, but High Browns are almost as reliable. Here's a shot unlikely to be replicated in the UK:

Niobe Fritillaries are also regular visitors:

Other 'tourists' to this spot were Marbled, Weaver's, Silver Washed, Heath and Knapweed Frits, meaning that EIGHT different members of this group were within camera range, often very docile and not at all unapproachable.

Here's a Marbled Frit:

...and a Weaver's:

Of course, there were several other Fritillaries seen at higher altitude that one wouldn't expect in the 'back garden' of a hotel at 1,000m....

[David M]

Quite a few higher altitude Frits were seen during the 10 day trip. Pearl Bordered were seen in small numbers even on the cusp of July, whilst Titania's Fritillary was relatively common between 1,500 and 2,000m:

False Heath became commoner at altitude above 1,400m and once one had reached 2,000m+, Cynthia's Fritillary was relatively predictable, with upwards of two dozen seen:

At these altitudes, the occasional Queen of Spain Fritillary would appear:

After two years' trying, I'm now starting to get 'my eye in' for Meadow Fritillaries:

There are still a couple more that I'm still to get to grips with which I will post tomorrow.

[Chris Jackson]

A good array of fritillaries, David; my favourites are Titania's, which I already have, and Cinthia's which is still on my wishlist.
I know its tricky when you get several hundreds of photos in a short space of time, making sure you match the undersides with the uppersides.
I must visit the Parc du Mercantour !!
Cheers, Chris

[David M]

You definitely need to get to 1,800m+, Chris, for things start to change quite markedly at that altitude (and it's also a welcome relief from the 90 degree heat lower down!)

A smattering of Glanville Fritillaries were about, including one rescued from a river! This individual looks pretty fresh:

This glorious spot discovered quite by chance was also home to the only place where Lesser Marbled Fritillary was found. Believe me, the sheltered area to the right of this image was positively swarming with butterflies, no doubt due to the lush vegetation growing beside the river:

Dozens of fresh males were skimming through the grasses in search of females. I gave up trying to photograph them on flowers as they refused to stay put for more than a few seconds. Instead, having pulled this individual out of a spider's web, I thought it appropriate to demand an underside in exchange for prolonging his life:

Anywhere above 2,000m seemed to harbour Shepherd's/Mountain Fritillaries. At one spot two of us spent half an hour in amazement as literally dozens of males flew just above the sward seeking females. A couple of handy cloudy periods brought some to earth and all my images seem to show the same species. But which?

I remarked to the guy I was with that such numbers of males must surely indicate the presence of females. Within minutes a much darker butterfly took flight. This is undeniably a female Mountain Fritillary:

I have to presume then, that the males too are napaea?

In the guides Shepherd's, in comparison to Mountain, has much less in the way of black markings in the marginal areas of the upper forewings, in the same way Pearl Bordered has less than Small Pearl Bordered.

I only get to spend a few hours with these montane species so they haven't yet imprinted on my subconscious!

[Padfield]

Hi David. I found a good spot last year where napaea and pales are both common and intend to go back very soon to photograph as many males as possible of both species. In the meantime, I'm wary of saying anything definitive!

Obviously, your female is napaea. The male upperside and underside are different individuals and I think different species. The upperside strikes me as pales, while the underside looks more like napaea. I'll update these comments when I've done my research!

Guy

[David M]

Appreciate that, Guy. I may well post several more pales/napaea in a different thread as I probably took images of at least 10 different males.

Meantime, in addition to the Fritillaries already mentioned, I also saw plenty of Spotted Fritillaries, which is normal in this part of the world. Unlike last year, there were no Marsh or Provençal observed, but I did get to meet a new species (for me) in the form of a handful of Grison's Fritillaries, which I might have cursorily dismissed as Meadow had Roger not been on alert:

The 'dumb-bell' reference in the guide is most apt, for that is just how the markings in the middle of space 1b on the forewings look!

The underside is even more attractive:

[David M]

Pierids

A healthy array of this family were seen during the trip. Large, Small and Green Veined White could usually be seen in lowish numbers, whilst Black Veined Whites seemed to crop up in ones and twos practically everywhere.

To the amusement of the group, Orange Tips were still going strong at altitude, and towards the end of my stay there was a significant emergence of Cleopatras which suddenly seemed to be all over the place (they had been relatively scarce earlier in the trip).

A 'lifer' for me was to finally see Peak White. This was probably the most excited Roger got on the whole trip. He suddenly spotted one which came to rest for about 3 seconds. I got a decent look at it but no photo, sadly.

Mountain Dappled White also fell into this 'should have seen the one that got away' category. This species isn't noted for its propensity to hang around - I saw three in total, and all of them were in a hurry!! Sometimes sunny and warm conditions can work against you.

One high altitude Pierid that DID settle was Mountain Green Veined White:

At lower levels, I was paying scant attention to this group - we saw 100+ Wood Whites but I never took a single photo! However, when a female Bath White appeared, I had my camera out before I could even see where she'd settled. I've seen flighty males before, but this was my first experience with the fairer sex of this species, and what a beauty she was: more heavily marked than the males and, thankfully, far more prone to have her image taken:

Berger's Clouded Yellows would pop up regularly.This individual, rather unusually, came to rest with wings partly open:

Amongst the yellow Brimstones were even darker Clouded Yellows:

There were other members of the colias genus - Mountain Clouded Yellow was very common at altitude, so much so that mating pairs were seen:

I'd never realised that they have such vivid green eyes!

Of course, they never rest wings open, but in this part of Europe, butterfly casualties are littered all over the roads. We found this unfortunate vehicle victim whose postscript is to provide a view of the rarely seen upperwings:

Moorland Clouded Yellows were also about, albeit in much smaller numbers:

[David M]

Satyrids

Heaths

There were four types of Heaths seen on the trip, the first, unsurprisingly, being Pearly Heath which is common to the point of distraction in SE France.

Normally, I pay little attention to them, but this one behind the thistle patch at the second hotel was behaving very strangely. I don't know whether there was something wrong with it but this individual was settling with its wings partly open when at rest, which is something I've never seen before (the uppersides are surprisingly attractive):

At a certain altitude, Pearlies give way to Darwin's Heath, which is a kind of intermediate. Here's one from 1,600m:

Chestnut Heaths were far more ubiquitous than they were last year with at least 50 seen at a range of altitudes:

The last of the bunch was Alpine Heath which, whilst not rare, seems to be rather more localised than its fellows: