www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

Can anyone tell if this is pales, napea or graeca from the upper alone? ( or none of these in which case I shall slit my wrists ).
Tony M.

I would go very strongly for graeca. It can't be napaea - that's a given. The rather heavy, broad spotting is good for graeca and I think too heavy and generally wrong for pales, though my local pales are of the very linear subspecies palustris so my perception might be a little distorted.

No. My perception is not distorted. I think this is graeca.

Guy

The sub-marginal spots on the hindwing seem to rule out pales and napaea.

Balkan Fritillary would be quite a find, Tony, in that part of the Alps, and I will ensure I pay more attention in future when in this part of the world, as it is a species I have long suspected could be flying amongst us when we have been there.

Thanks, Guys. That counts as a win - graeca was my choice .

T.

I would say graeca almost certainly. I think the reason you saw it Tony and we didn't (even the second week of the tour 2-9 July) is that it tends to emerge mid-July, so we would have been too early. Also, it tends to fly in limited regions further east than where the tour went, although we did see one in 2014 in the location we didn't visit this year. Prior to that, I had not seen it since 2006 mainly because I am in the region too early.

Tony, can I pm you when I'm back in the UK at the weekend, as I would be interested in the location as we are building up a picture of its distribution in CEN-PACA? David, I can give you locations for graeca if you wish.

I'm currently in the Vanoise where it is either barren or fantastic - a couple of days ago I was at a spot where I guess 500 butterflies were puddling in a 20m radius - 51 species that did not include Common Blue, Meadow Brown, Small Heath, Marbled White, Small White - I counted 15 types of blue and 14 types of fritillary.

Roger

You sure know how to tease, Roger! I feel almost bereaved back here in the UK as numbers of late summer butterflies appear lower than I've ever seen, but it's nice to know you've seen such a range of species in a restricted area and yes, any information regarding Balkan Frit would be welcome, given that we haven't yet seen this on any of the Alps tours.

Thank you for the input, Roger - I'll have a look at my maps and try and give you an accurate position. What did you think of the gracea ab in the post? I'm not used to this stuff, but it looked pretty astonishing to me.

T.

I don't think anyone is used to aberrations like this. I have seen one or two mild aberrations of fritillaries, but nothing like this - this is exceptional - and a great find.

It must be graeca from the hindwing angle, but fortunately this clue means we don't have to rely on any markings.

Roger