Rome

[Vince Massimo]

I have just returned from a 5-day trip to Rome, which included some butterfly sightings. I spent the end of the last day (7th October) having a final wander around the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill where there were several species flying amongst the many flowery areas, but the best part was around the top of the Hill. The temperature was a comfortable 21C.

Roman Forum

The following species were noted over the space of 2 hours:

Red Admiral 40+
Small White 30+
(Eastern) Bath White 15+
Long-tailed Blue 15+
Lang's Short-tailed Blue 15+
Large White 10+
Mallow Skipper 6
Clouded Yellow 3
Common Blue 1
Wall 1
Meadow Brown 1
Painted Lady 1
Scarce Swallowtail 1
Southern Small White 1 (possible)

Lizard/Long-tailed Blue/Snake

Other open areas and parks around Rome also produced two confirmed sightings of Geranium Bronze and a Small Copper during the holiday.

Vince

[Chris Jackson]

Hi Vince,
It is interesting to note that you had exactly the same sightings in Rome as you would have in the South of France at the same time (except the Bath White would be "regular").
End-of-season species are comfortably reliable and constant at this latitude.
Chris

[David M]

That's a brave boeticus nestled between two creatures that would happily eat her!

[Padfield]

According to the maps in Leraut, daplidice, not edusa, predominates in Italy. Edusa flies in an area of Italy north of Rome and can be found further afield, but daplidice is found all over the country. I have absolutely no idea how accurate Leraut's maps are, I should add.

I think the two species can be separated in a majority of cases from a good view of the underside - I'm still gathering data on that. I would be very interested to see any good underside shots you got of daplidice/edusa from Rome.

Guy

[Vince Massimo]

Thanks Chris and David .

Guy, I did not manage to get any good photos of the Bath Whites (or much else). My identification of the species was based only on the distribution map published in Tolman which shows daplidice to be absent from Italy. To be honest, it's not a critical issue for me personally, but it would be interesting to get to the bottom of the matter.

Vince