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Hi all - back from a superb week in northern Italy near Sarnano. Full report to follow in due course, but the highlights were:

- Waking up to see High Brown Fritillary, Wall, Swallowtail, Essex Skipper, Small Tortoiseshell, Queen of Spain Fritillary, Hummingbird Hawkmoth and Clouded Yellow nectaring on the lavendar in the garden (which regularly had a count in excess of 300 butterflies each morning!!!)
- Hundreds of Large Tortoiseshell in the Sibillini mountains
- Black-veined Whites in abundance
- Mazarine Blue everywhere
- Seeing my first Large Chequered Skippers!
- Good numbers of Small Tortoiseshell everywhere (something I miss)
- Seeing a Golden Eagle flying above our heads in the mountains
- Excellent scenery
- Stunning wild flowers
- Great company!
- Finding larvae (and pupae) everywhere we went

One critter that foxed us is the one shown below (followed by some random pics) - gregarious groups of black caterpillar on young blackthorn bushes up in the mountains. Any ideas anyone? Looks like a nymphalid, but what do I know?

Cheers,

- Pete

Fabulous fabulous photographs! Oh it makes my heart glad to see so many butterflies on the lavender.

Mamma mia !!

lovely photos Pete

Carlo

Glad you got your large chequered skippers, Pete! Isn't that just the best butterfly? They fly as if they were on elastic strings held by a puppet-master.

Look forward to the full report.

Guy

The blue bee could be Xylocopa violacea which is increasingly turning up along the south coast of England and could be a colonist in the next few years. They are pretty spectacular insects!

By the way - unless I'm mistaken that is a scarce copper (virgaureae) rather than purple-edged (hippothoe)! Isn't it annoying when I do that!

Guy

EDIT - I'm beginning to regret that post now! I've never seen eurydame without a cell spot in the forewing or with those black spots on the hindwing, but I've now found web pictures with both those characters. So assuming you saw the underside, apologies, Pete!!

Yeah - here's one with the underside. According to Lafranchis, this is the "high altitude" form of the species

Still wondering what those darn larvae are though

Cheers,

- Pete

Amazing! I think that means I've never seen real eurydame here in Swwitzerland, even though we get some very dark females.

Guy

PS - The larvae baffle me, too. I've been through my Swiss book, which has photographs of the larvae of all species, and nothing that might feed on blackthorn looks like that.

Pete
It's a bit late, but I have just found your photo of mystery larvae on blackthorn. I think they may be young larvae of Saturnia pavoniella, a close relative of our Emperor moth. Have a look at http://www.leps.it.

Misha

Hi Misha,

You are absolutely spot on. I should have replied myself to the question - but I received confirmation a while back that this is what these larvae were.

Thanks for the response!

Cheers,

- Pete

Oh wow Pete.
I've only just spotted this thread, I must have missed it after my hols last year. What stunning photo's.
Only 8 weeks till i'm off to mainland Europe butterflying for the first time. Can't wait!
Denise

If your trip is anything like my first dedicated trip abroad, you're going to be absolutely blown away by the experience. Which is why I do this every year now!

Look forward to seeing your pics/report, Denise!

Cheers,

- Pete