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Large Heath - Favourite Photo of 2015

Week 9

So continues sequence of posts giving one and all the opportunity to showcase their favourite shots of 2015!

Please could I ask that everyone waits until a topic has been opened by me for a particular species before posting photos? Of course our overseas members are very welcome to fill in the obvious gaps relating to rare UK migrants. As like last year details of locations, dates, times and circumstances would be welcome as would any accompanying stories and anecdotes or other observations of behaviour and interesting other points.

Have a goodun

Wurzel

What can I say about my Large Heath photos but I hope to get better shots next year Being as it's the first time I'd them and they didn't land any where near me ( excuses) I decided to post some any way.

We would go up to Meathop on the hottest day of the year 30th of June in the North and Butterflies were hard to photo so I tried to shoot them in flight, tried being the word Goldie

On the eve of my French Alps trip at the end of June, I took time out to pay a visit to Whixhall Moss in Shropshire where plenty of Large Heaths were flying.

This female was the one I got closest to:

Did a quick? 600 mile round trip to the lake district from the south coast in early july to catch up with three species for the first time - including this one
Kind Regards
Mark

Here is one from eastern France, rather different from the UK subspecies. I believe it to be of the subspecies tiphon (Coenonympha tullia tiphon), but the taxonomy is not entirely clear. Just to confuse the issue in France, the not-dissimilar Chestnut Heath (Coenonympha glycerion) also flies, quite often in company with tullia. Glycerion is hugely variable in terms of the ocelli – the common form at altitude bertolis has no ocelli – but fortunately there are definitive ways of telling the two apart. Also, bizarrely, it could also be confused with the Small Heath (C. pamphilus) which is often quite large and can have very well developed hindwing ocelli.

Just to illustrate how scarce and localised it is in France, perhaps even more so than the UK, here is the distribution map for France.
http://diatheo.weebly.com/coenonympha-tullia.html

Roger

Goldie M wrote:Butterflies were hard to photo so I tried to shoot them in flight, tried being the word Goldie

I absolutely love these shots, Goldie.

Guy

Goldie M wrote:Butterflies were hard to photo so I tried to shoot them in flight, tried being the word

I agree with Guy, especially over the first two, where the lighting has made the butterflies really stand out from the background

Mike

Roger Gibbons wrote:
Just to illustrate how scarce and localised it is in France, perhaps even more so than the UK, here is the distribution map for France.
http://diatheo.weebly.com/coenonympha-tullia.html

Thanks for that link, Roger. Very interesting indeed.

I presume it's a new(ish) website?

David,

It is Tristan Lafranchis' site. The maps are the same as on the DVD that accompanies his latest work La Vie des Papillons, so I am a little surprised that it is freely available. I think it is fairly recent, the site says October 2015.

It is not possible to save the images from the DVD, but I had just worked out how to "screen grab" the images and insert them into a Word document so I could save them. Then I find out this was all unnecessary. No matter.

I too love Goldie's action shots - it's the only way we we'll ever see the uppersides. I thought that the caption for the middle photo could be "bandits at 12 o'clock".

Roger

David M wrote:

Roger Gibbons wrote:
Just to illustrate how scarce and localised it is in France, perhaps even more so than the UK, here is the distribution map for France.
http://diatheo.weebly.com/coenonympha-tullia.html

Thanks for that link, Roger. Very interesting indeed.

I presume it's a new(ish) website?

David, Roger,
They also have a month-by-month feature (a very small claim to fame):
http://diatheo.weebly.com/papillons-agr ... mbre1.html
Chris

What can I say but thanks so very much Guy's, I don't feel too badly about the shots now
The Large Heath that day were very active but not near me, so has they flashed passed I did my best. It was so exciting watching them. Goldie

I too think your shots are original and precious, Goldie.
This butterfly doesn't exist in my 'exotic' outpost.
Chris.

Chris Jackson wrote:They also have a month-by-month feature

Yes, I'd spotted that little cameo, Chris.

I see that not every species has a distribution map. I was considering purchasing the book but probably would not do so unless every butterfly had comprehensive details.