The Butterflies of the British IslesSouth, Richard
Science
The Butterflies of the British Isles
South, Richard
Butterflies -- Great Britain; Butterflies -- Great Britain -- Identification; Lepidoptera -- Great Britain
There is considerable variation, and it is, therefore, deemed advisable
to give a number of figures representing some of the more striking
aberrations. The three figures at the top of Plate 101 depict the normal
male and female; the latter sex is Fig. 3. For the loan of the other
specimens (Figs. 4-12) my thanks are due to Mr. E. Sabine, who has a
very fine and extensive series of varieties of this butterfly. Other
examples of aberration on the under side are shown on Plate 119. Blue
spots are sometimes found on the hind wings; these are placed near the
orange-red band, and occasionally they attain a good size. Specimens
much suffused with blackish sometimes occur; these are referable to var.
_eleus_, which is the usual summer form in some of the warmer countries
abroad. A very rare form is that known as _schmidtii_ (Fig. 7), in which
the ground colour of the fore wings and the band on the hind wings are
silvery white instead of orange or coppery-red. A modification of this
form which is hardly less rare has a creamy tint. Straw-coloured or pale
golden specimens are rather more frequently met with. The colour of the
hind wings in fresh specimens is sometimes steely-grey, but blackish is
the more usual hue; the band on the outer area, which as a rule agrees
in colour with the fore wings, varies in width a good deal, and
occasionally is more or less obscured by the blackish ground colour. The
arrangement, size, and shape of the black spots, both above and below,
are subject to much vagary, sometimes of a very striking kind, as, for
example, when the spots of the outer series on the fore wings are united
with the discal pair and form a large irregular blotch. A remarkable
specimen taken some years ago in the Isle of Wight had a small patch of
copper with a black spot in it on the under side. This gave one the idea
of a clumsy attempt at patching, but as I happened to take that
particular specimen, I know that it had not been tampered with.
Gynandrous specimens of this butterfly sometimes occur, but these are
very rare.
The egg is of a yellowish-white colour at first, and afterwards becomes
greyish; the pattern on the shell, which resembles network, is always
whiter.
The caterpillar is green and similar in tint to the leaf of dock or
sorrel upon which it feeds. It is clothed with short greyish hair which
arises from white dots; the dorsal line is brownish-olive, and the ring
divisions, especially along the back, are well defined. Head very small,
pale brownish, marked with blackish, drawn into the first ring of the
body when resting. The legs and prolegs are tinged with pink, and
sometimes the body is marked with pink.
The chrysalis is pale brown, sometimes tinged with greenish, and
freckled with darker brown; there is a dark line along the middle of the
thorax and body, the wing cases are streaked with blackish, and the body
is dotted with black. Attached by the tail and loose silken threads
around the body to a leaf or stem.
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