I'm glad it wasn't entirely wasted time, Paul, watching Diocletian give birth slowly to alien creatures... Opportunities like that to get
w-album down low are to be treasured!
I asked Yannick about male
pales/
napaea today. It turns out he is in exactly the same position as I am. In fact, he doesn't think there is a definitive way of telling them apart that works in every instance - it is more like
hyale/
alfacariensis, where you can tell some of the time but not always. Like me, he waits for the females to appear... I'm sure there is a way, though, and I will try to find it!!
We didn't go for
christi in the end. Last year Matt and I had a very, very tatty female a little earlier in July and the weather was a bit iffy today, so we decided to go hunting
populi instead. WHICH WE SAW!! Against all the odds, fleetingly, without photo-ops, a rather worn male, but undeniably
populi. My second of the year.
Here is Yannick, the energetic young man solely responsible for mapping Swiss butterflies, enjoying a lesser purple emperor (in the Rhône Valley, where neither of us have seen them before, though we knew they were supposed to be there):
And here is the lesser purple emperor in question, doing what emperors do...
Thanks to a few lucky breaks, including a small Apollo and a single, knackered, blue-spot hairstreak, my year total reached 196 today. I'm saving that fine old brandy you left, Paul, for no. 200!!!
Guy