Thanks for all the various comments. I've been enjoying a flute and piano evening so haven't been at the computer to reply. Oh, and wine and brandy, still left over from the UK Butts delegation, for which many thanks!!
E. flavofasciata is, like many
Erebia, a real species with a very restricted distribution. I say 'real species' because it is clearly different from anything else, in form, habit, habitat &c., and yet occurs only in a tiny region in Switzerland and Italy (in two subspecies - one in the Grisons and one in the Tessin/Italy region, which is the one I saw today - all the individuals on Matt's site are of the Grisons subspecies). Luckily, its domain is so remote and difficult to reach it is entirely unthreatened by human activity. The colony I visited today was last recorded in the 1960s, before Yannick checked up on it last year (he is religiously working through all the ancient records, verifying or in some cases rejecting them). It continued unobserved through all the intervening years, obviously. If rain hadn't stopped play, our second mission today would have been to do a census in a nearby 1km square that has never been recorded, ever! Who knows what we might have found.
I've only got three Swiss
Erebia left to see and might well take a trip next week to find two of them,
sudetica and
nivalis, which fly close to each other. I find this really exciting - these species have persisted since the last ice age in tiny communities. Each
Erebia is truly a different species - as different as Adonis blue and chalkhill blue - but in reality more like a family or clan than a species. It's almost personal to discover each tiny community. The third and last
Erebia will be
styx, which I won't see this year. That will be a mission for next year.
Jack, the 'patina' of certain fresh satyrids and lycaenids is undoubtedly related, at least in terms of physics, to the colours of female
napaea. But in this last case it is taken to a whole new level, where it becomes an essential part of the colouring, just as the purple refraction of a purple emperor is an essential part of its colouring. It is a beautiful and surprising thing to see in a fritillary - almost as surprising as the fabulously original white colouration of
cynthia, a species I saw plenty of today, confirming my theory that it is actually a reasonably common butterfly but in high mountainous areas that are extremely difficult to reach on foot!!
![Image](http://www.guypadfield.com/images2010/cynthia104.jpg)
(A male
cynthia at 2400m today)
Guy