Identification Problems with Fritillaries.

The fritillaries can be difficult to identify and if it were not for the fact some larvae of very similar species feed on different plants it would be tempting to say that fritillaries are over classified. The problem is also complicated by  a lot of intra-specific variation. This blog has used photographs to identify butterflies with a quick ID photograph being taken as soon as possible from which the identity of the butterfly can be ascertained - before getting on with the "intimate portraits". With the fritillaries two photographs are needed of each individual because both the underside and topside markings are often critical to identification. The initial problem was that, although photographs of both top and bottom side were taken, looking at them later on the computer it was not possible to be sure that two sequential photographs  were the same individual. To overcome this problem a waste photograph is now taken between different butterflies to indicate the change. It now seems probable that there are three species of fritillary in the field, the Glanville fritillary easily identified by its very regular pattern and spots on the underside; the knapweed fritillary identified by the large lunule on the upper fore wing; a third difficult to identify fritillary which is probably the meadow fritillary but could be heath or Provencal fritillary. The latter is unlikely because the range of that species seems to be further east than Le Port. The relatively weak markings suggest a meadow fritillary is the most likely of the three species and the underside markings seem to be most similar to this species. The heath fritillary remains a possibility because the species is so varied.

Later on the same afternoon I finally photographed a heath fritillary (Mellicta athalia) bringing the total number of fritillary species flying over the field to four.(Glanville, knapweed, meadow and heath,)

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Above: unidentified fritillary on ragwort, this is probably the meadow fritillary Mellicta parthenoides.


Below: underside of what is probably meadow fritillary but this is not the same individual as the one in the photograph above - click on images to enlarge and get a better view of the detail.

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Heath fritillary (Mellicta athalia) I.D. photograph.