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This one confused me on Sunday whilst roaming the Moor Copse Nature Reserve at Tidmarsh in Berkshire, wasn't quite sure what it was until checking the field guide.

rolf wrote:This one confused me on Sunday whilst roaming the Moor Copse Nature Reserve at Tidmarsh in Berkshire, wasn't quite sure what it was until checking the field guide.

Hi Rolf,

This is an excellent find: a Small Copper aberration ab.cuprinus (peyer).

In ab.cuprinus the normal 'copper' ground colour is replaced by a pale straw colour, beautifully illustrated by your photographs.

At first glance I did consider ab.schmidtii, however in schmidtii the ground colour is silvery white, and has the same 'metallic' appearance that one associates with 'normal' Small Coppers. The cream tint on your specimen has steered me to ab.cuprinus rather than ab.schmidtii.

This is not at all common so very good spot..!

Felix.

Thanks for the info Felix, very pleased with the find, bit of a butterfly novice.

Yes. An excellent find Rolf.Well done

Hi again Rolf,

Pretty good for a novice

I don't know if you live near Tidmarsh, but it may be worth looking out for this aberration again in the future. I can not be 100% certain that cuprinus is genetically inherited (there's a possibility that the ground colour change was environmentally triggered; I have seen specimens where one side of the butterfly is 'normal' and the other side almost white) but ab.schmidtii certainly is and can crop up year after year in small colonies where it occurs. Happy hunting...!

Felix.

Yes, only a couple of miles from me Felix, will drop down there again, it is one of my regular (every few months) haunts.