www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

Hi
Can anyone point me to (or send me?) a current and accurate list of European Butterflies (just scientific names would be fine).



Thanks

This is the current comprehensive list, until they start debating the taxonomy again.....

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

Thanks Roger.
Just what I was looking for.

Roger
Actually - on closer inspection this list has Peacock as Aglais not Inachis io, or am I wrong, and it is now Aglais?
Are there others like this at odds with Tolman/Lewington?
It also doesn't have Cryptic WW (juvernica)- that is easily added though.
Cheers

Hi Rodge,

The most accurate list is the one that Roger has pointed you at. At one point, as that list was being developed, it was changing every month with new research and DNA analysis coming to light, and species being "lumped" and "split" accordingly. Since the list was published things have continued to change and it looks like the placement of juvernica as a species in its own right has yet to be incorporated.

One real downside of the list is that it's in alphabetical and not taxonomic order - something we tried to correct when Guy, Chris Manley, Matt Rowlings and I tried to correct when creating the Lepidapp app (see http://www.lepidapp.co.uk/). During that process I analysed Tolman and Lewington (which has a broader coverage than BCE) and reconciled with the BCE list. The result is attached - have fun!

The taxonomy used on UKB is taken from "Checklist of Lepidoptera Recorded from the British Isles" by J.D.Bradley - for the main reason that it is consistent and complete - containing not just British species, but adventives (e.g. The Julia), as well as subspecies and forms, not found in any other list.

Cheers,

- Pete

Pete
Thanks for that interesting spread sheet.
Unfortunately it has just added to my confusion.
I now find Tolman/Lewington - a book I had relied on as being the most up to date reference work on the Butterflies of Europe is now seriously out dated.
When did the large Blue stop being Maculinia and become Phengaris?
Is it now Pieris or Artogeria?
Polyommatus or Agrodiaetus/Lysandra/Plebicula?
Boloria or Clossiana?
Melitaea or Mellicta?
Euphydryas, Eurodryas or Hypodryas?
The good old Peacock - surely it is still Inachis - when did it become Aglais?

Pete - I am now more confused than I was before I asked my question!

Is there a DEFINITIVE, accepted list? - or do we have to wait for the Taxonomists to finish (which they obviously never will).
It does seem that the common/vernacular names are more constant than the scientific ones - which sort of defeats the arguments for using scientific names.
Or am I just being naïve?

Thanks again though for a few hours entertainment - and confusion.

For the most part, specific names remain constant, though there are exceptions - the large skipper, for example, had to stop being venatus when the species was split. That name adhered to the eastern species because the type specimen was eastern. For a while faunus replaced it for the European species but now sylvanus is regarded as being correct. Where the specific name is adjectival and regarded as qualifying the generic name it also has to agree in gender with that name, meaning that the ending might change when the genus changes. Thus, Albulina orbitula becomes Plebejus orbitulus in the new, lumped classification. On the continent, most people refer to butterflies just by their specific name. Vernacular names are pretty useless if you change have to change languages just moving from one end of the valley to the other, as I do in Switzerland! That's the real beauty of scientific names - not that they don't change but that you can sit in a bar in Spain and chat about what you've seen without having to learn a few hundred new names!

The iconic genus Maculinea was busted quite some time ago. Very interestingly, the species that used to be grouped under that name represent a kind of ecological convergence and are actually genetically quite diverse. If you want alcon and arion to be in the same genus you have to expand it to include morphologically and ecologically quite different Asian species in the genus Phengaris. Maculinea is not taxonomically valid, not being cladal, so had to go.

Tolman is seriously out of date. No updating was included in the now not-so-new Collins Guide edition and much has happened in the world of taxonomy since the first edition came out. Nevertheless, the forms it describes and illustrates remain valid, if you just rename them!

On my website I stuck with the old genera as long as I could, because the smaller groups are more useful for a field naturalist (it is helpful to distinguish Boloria from Clossiana because our species in these two groups are morphologically distinct). But in the end I had to give in to rationalisation! When an old genus is cladal, and so can be regarded as a subgenus, I include it in brackets on my site.

Guy

And sometimes names change completely. For example, "Epinephele ianira" in Frohawk is now "Maniola jurtina". Which makes it really difficult to track down historic information unless you know all of the synonyms too!

Unless there is some good reason (such as that given for UKB), I'd start with the BCE listing (which the app aligns with, and then makes additions for other geographic regions not covered by Tolman). As Guy says, Tolman is out of date in this regard.

Cheers,

- Pete