Corfu Butterflies - June 2017

This year's family summer holiday was to the Greek island of Corfu. A fantastic place for a holiday with lovely scenery, warm sea and the most friendly, generous people I have ever met. My parents holidayed there in the 1970s and came back with stories about how lovely the people were there and it seems they still are!!

We rented a villa in an olive grove at the north east of the island, above Nisaki. It was built on a steep slope, so there were two stories with the swimming pool build into the hillside at roof level. I thought this would provide a great vantage point for seeing butterflies, but compared with other areas on the island there were not that many there.

I am not quite sure where to start with the butterflies, so here is a summary of what I saw at the villa and in the surrounding area.

We arrived at our villa at about 6pm and I was delighted to see a number of butterflies flying around a small cherry tree by the front door. There was a pair of Large Wall Browns, Lasiommata maera ...

... four or five Great Banded Graylings, Brintesia circe ...

... two Speckled Woods, Pararge aegeria ...

... a Lattice Brown, Kirinia roxelana ...

... and about ten Eastern Rock Graylings, Hipparchia syriaca.

The following day these butterflies were still there, feeding on the over-ripe and fallen fruit and flying up in a cloud each time we walked past. Over the course of the day I also saw a Small White, Pieris rapae, Cleopatra, Gonepteryx cleopatra, Swallowtail, Papilio machaon, Scarce Swallowtail, Iphiclides podalirius, Balkan Marbled White, Melanargia larissa, and a Silver-washed Fritillary, Argynnis paphia, flying past the villa, but none of them stopped.

There was a wisteria plant growing at the front of the villa and this attracted Mallow Skippers, Carcharodus alceae, Long-tailed Blues, Lampides boeticus, and a Lang's Short-tailed Blue, Leptotes pirithous.

However, by the fourth day the usual five species disappeared from around the cherry tree. I suspect that the housekeeper had sprayed around the tree to kill the ants, as there was still plenty of fruit around.

The butterflies continued to fly past the villa, but rarely settled. Half way through our holiday I was thrilled to see a Spotted Fritillary, Melitaea didyma, fly past the villa and land briefly on a bay tree. I was frustrated that it didn't stay long enough for a photo, though! However, on our last day a Spotted Fritillary landed near the villa and started laying eggs on a dried up plantain plant.

I had read that the olive groves in Corfu are sprayed against disease, which has had a bad impact on wildlife that would otherwise occur there. I guess that the olive trees around the villa had been sprayed. Elsewhere on the island there were loads of butterflies, which I will write about in my next posts.

Troodos Mountains - Butterflies

On 28th July I decided to head for the Troodos Mountains in search of some different species of butterflies. I had been told that many species make their way up into the cooler mountains from the coast in the summer. There are also various other species that are only found in the mountains.
I drove along the coast and then up the F616 towards Troodos, stopping a few times whenever I saw a spot that looked good for butterflies.
My first stop was to take a picture of the view, but I noticed a small patch of Heliotropium europaeum, so thought I should check if any butterflies were feeding on it. There was a very old and tattered Common Blue and then I noticed a really small butterfly. I was delighted to see that it was a Grass Jewel, Chilades trochylus. It was so small that I could only follow its shadow as it flew from flower to flower.

 

All along the road I saw Swallowtails and Small White as I drove along. Further up in the hills I stopped a couple of times to look for some of the Grayling species that occur on Cyprus. However, all I saw were Long-tailed Blues.
Eventually, I arrived at Pano Paltres and just as I was leaving the village I saw a small parking area with walking trail. This was a rough tail following a small river up to Caledonian Falls.
As I started to walk up the track I saw several butterflies. The first I thought was another Long-tailed Blue, but it turned out to be a Purple Hairstreak, Favonius quercus. This was a surprise as I have been lead to believe that the Purple Hairstreak is rare in Cyprus and this was in an area of fruit trees with no sign of any oak trees - their normal food plant.

It allowed me to take one picture, but then flew off. There were a number of Long-tailed Blues at this lower end of the track along with Holly Blues. An Oriental Meadow Brown, Hyponephele lupina, briefly landed at the side of the trail and I was able to take a quick picture before someone walked past and disturbed it.

A little further up the track three Large Whites were feeding on a plant. I was about to take a picture of one of them when three kids ran up with fishing nets swiping at the butterflies!! Unfortunately, this walk proved to be very popular and it was difficult to see any butterflies for any length of time before they were disturbed by someone walking past.

However, this area had a good number of different butterfly species. I was surprised to see a few Speckled Woods, Pararge aegeria, here.

Amongst the Speckled Woods I was teased by a number of dark butterflies that would not let me approach them. I would only notice them when they flew up from the rocks on the trail. They would always land too far away for me to identify them, but I did manage to take a couple of pictures on full zoom which allowed me to identify two of them as Cyprus Graylings, Hipparchia cypriensis. One is a male and one is a female.

One other butterfly I was able to identify was the Lattice Brown, Kirinia roxelana. This is a very striking butterfly with large brown ocelli on its wings. I disturbed it as I was walking up the trail, it flew off and landed next to a rock and then crawled into the vegetation. Unfortunately it flew off when I tried to get a better view of it.
All along the trail there were Holly Blues, Celastrina argiolus, resting on leaves, feeding on flowers and drinking from the damp soil at the edge of the river.

The walk to the falls was well worth the climb with the fine spray nicely cooling the air.

On my return journey, as I was driving through Paltres I noticed a large thistle with some Large Whites, Pieris brassicae, feeding on it. I stopped the car and walked back thinking that I could get a photograph to make up for those chased away by the kids earlier.

While I was watching them a Clouded Yellow, Colias croceus, and a White-banded Grayling, Pseudochazara anthelea, briefly landed on the thistles, each allowing me just enough time to take a fuzzy photograph!

On my way home I stopped off a few more times. In a small field just outside Kedares there was a small irrigation channel surrounded by wild flowers. Among them I saw several Common Blues, Polyommatus icarus.

The field also contained many Large Whites, Holly Blues, Clouded Yellows, including the white form helice, a Speckled Wood and a Cleopatra. A little further down the road next to a layby I saw another Grass Jewel and a Mallow Skipper.
All together a very successful day searching for butterflies.