Serra de Mariola, Spain - Butterflies September 2025

In September we took a week's holiday to the south of Spain, staying in a hotel in the mountains above Benidorm. I didn't go with any great expectations of seeing many butterflies, but I hadn’t realised quite how few there would be there. Despite the hotel having a large golf course around it, plenty of flowering shrubs and the roads in the area having irrigated trees along the pavements there were very few butterflies around.

All I managed to see was a couple of Long-tailed Blues and Lang’s Short-tailed Blues on some Dittrichia viscosa, known as False Yellowhead, growing near a roundabout.

There were some lovely Lantana bushes growing next to the road, which I thoroughly checked. Although there were plenty of insects including little black and white bees, and some moths, there were no butterflies. 

Back at the hotel a lone Geranium Bronze, Cacyreus marshalli, flew past, but sadly there was no sign of them on any of the numerous Geraniums.

So, one day I rented a car and drove up into the mountains to the Parc Natural de la Serra de Mariola, about 40 kilometres inland. I chose this area by looking on Google maps for a green area with north-facing slopes.

The scenery was much greener in the mountains and as soon as I arrived I spotted butterflies from the car. A couple of times I jammed on the brakes and jumped out to go after them! They turned out to be Small Whites and Cardinals, Argynnis pandora.

Eventually, I arrived at the spot I had chosen - the Area Recreative Font de Mariola. It was actually my second choice of location as in my panic to set my sat nav after picking up the car I clicked on a slightly different location from where I intended. I had intended to walk along the Vinalopo River along the advertised blue walking route.

I parked under a tree in a small car park with some picnic benches. There was a small irrigation channel running below the car park and a green area of grass and wild flowers next to it. On a patch of Lucern next to the water there were a number of Lang’s Short-tailed Blues, Leptotes pirithous,

... and Long-tailed Blues, Lampides boeticus, feeding. 

Flying along the grass was a white butterfly which turned out to be a helice form of the Clouded Yellow, Colias croceus.

Just above the car park I spotted a Wall Brown, Lasiommata megera, flying.

I decided to walk down a track through an area of Pine trees. There was scrub and wild flowers growing below them. Off to the side I saw a small white butterfly, which I quickly realised was a Wood White, Leptidea sinapis. It flew from flower to flower, not stopping for more than a second at each. I followed it as best I could hoping that it would settle for a while. All I could manage was a slightly over-exposed picture.

By this time I was some way off the track and I found a smaller path, which had a lot of butterflies flying along it. There were loads of blues, which mostly turned out to be Adonis Blues, Polyommatus bellargus.

I have only seen an Adonis Blue a couple of times before, but here I must have seen about 15 or 20 of them.

Afterwards I noticed that one of my pictures was of a Southern Blue, Polyommatus celina.

There were quite a number of brown butterflies flying around there, too. Most of them were very worn-out Cardinals, which seemed to chase after any other butterflies they encountered.

There were a few Tree Graylings, Hipparchia statilinus, the first time I have seen this species.

One or two Rock Graylings, Hipparchia hermione, another new species for me! 

And some Striped Graylings, Hipparchia fidia.

There were quite a number of Wall Browns and two Small Coppers, Lycaena phlaeas. 

Also two Sage Skippers, Muschampia proto, one very worn out and the other very 

fresh-looking.

On my way back I also spotted a female Wood White and a “normal” yellow form of Clouded Yellow. This was the only yellow one I saw compared to six or seven of the helice form.

I was so pleased that I had made the effort to drive away from the coast and up into the mountains. I am always delighted to see butterflies when I am on holiday and those that I saw this time were a little different from what I have seen in other areas of Spain. 

Back at the hotel on our last day I went for another walk along the roads around the hotel. There was just a Lang’s Short-tailed blue on the False Yellowhead patch and then out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw something land on a shrub close by. I zoomed my camera right in to the branch where I thought it landed and spotted a little face!

It looked like a skipper of some sort, so I braved the thorns and strange looks from passing motorists and scrambled into the vegetation! I managed to get a picture from the side and then confirm that it was a Mediterranean Skipper, Gegenes nostrodamus.

We didn’t have to leave the hotel until 3pm, so spent the day sitting by the pool. Strangely, I saw a Swallowtail fly past on three occasions and in a garden area there was a Two-tailed Pasha flying around the trees.

I had been pondering on why there were so few butterflies around, all along the coast. I remember reading that in Costa Rica many species migrate up into the mountains during the dry season and I wonder if something similar happens in Southern Spain. There were areas of green in the hills around the hotel and there were plenty of flowering plants in the hotel, along the roads and in parks. Maybe it is just natural that butterflies leave the coast in the hotter months and not the result of all of the development in the area.