Another 'Taxon' question

[Gary Hulbert]

Hi guys, spurred on by recent taxon discussions on previous postings (really interesting thanks guys) I though I would pose my own all be 'Simples' one.
Confused by the synonyms for various species i.e Mellicta athalia (Tolman & Lewington) for Melitaea athalia - Heath Fritillary, my question is this:
Can someone please tell me what the most recent taxon names are for butterfly species in Europe/Palearctic- if possible, and where can I access it
Thanks guys this should make reporting more up to date and satisfy the little OCD in me, cheers Gary

[Pete Eeles]

Hi Gary - the spreadsheet here is used by the BC European Interest Group:

http://www.bc-eig.org.uk/species.html

You might find some species missing, and this is because they've been "lumped" with other species in most cases. When we did the analysis for the Butterflies of Europe app, we found the following "missing":

Cupido carswelli - Carswell's Little Blue
Maculinea rebeli - Mountain Alcon Blue
Agrodiaetus ainsae - Forster's Furry Blue
Agrodiaetus agenjoi - Agenjo's Anomalous Blue
Lysandra philippi - Macedonian Chalk-hill Blue
Polyommatus andronicus - Phalakron Blue
Polyommatus eroides - False Eros Blue
Polyommatus menelaos - Taygetos Blue
Vanessa indica - Indian Red Admiral
Coenonympha elbana - Elban Heath
Coenonympha darwiniana - Darwin's Heath

You'll notice that the species aren't in taxonomic order - and so we used (to a large extent) the order in Tolman and Lewington.

Cheers,

- Pete

[Gary Hulbert]

Thanks Pete for your reply, I will have a look as you've suggested and am sure this will help me standardize my reports when I start this year. Kindest regards Gary