Whitehead

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Whitehead
White-tailed eye (Satyrus ferula), male

White-tailed eye ( Satyrus ferula ), male

Systematics
Class : Insects (Insecta)
Order : Butterflies (Lepidoptera)
Family : Noble butterfly (Nymphalidae)
Subfamily : Eye butterflies (Satyrinae)
Genre : Satyrus
Type : Whitehead
Scientific name
Satyrus ferula
( Fabricius , 1793)
Underside of the wing of the female
Underside of the wings of the male

The white-nosed eye ( Satyrus ferula ), sometimes also called the southern forest porter , is a butterfly (day butterfly ) from the noble butterfly family (Nymphalidae).

features

butterfly

The moths reach a wingspan of 50 to 60 millimeters. The upper side of the wings of the males is black-brown and shows two to four small black eye-spots on each of the fore wings, which are white core. In the female, the eye spots are significantly larger and underlaid with a mostly orange band in the post-disk region . Both sexes vary in color, especially the marbling of the undersides. This has a range from pale yellow-brown to reddish brown to dark brown. The eye spots on the front show through.

Caterpillar

Adult caterpillars are light brown in color and alternately whitish and dark brown striped lengthways. The light brown head also shows noticeable dark vertical stripes.

Similar species

The blue-eyed forest porter ( Minois dryas ) clearly differs in the males by the blue centering of the eye spots. This feature is not always that obvious in the females, but they lack an orange post-disk band.

distribution and habitat

The white pit eye is locally widespread in Switzerland , Morocco , southern Europe, Asia Minor, Iran , as well as parts of Central Asia and Siberia as far as the Himalayas and western China . The species occurs at altitudes up to 2000 meters. It prefers to colonize poor grasslands with shrubs, rocky slopes and dry forest clearings.

Way of life

The moths fly in one generation with the main flight time from mid-June to mid-August. They sometimes suck on scabiosa - ( Scabiosa ) and thistle flowers. The eggs are individually attached to dry blades of grass, from which the young caterpillars hatch in late summer. These feed on various fescue species ( Festuca ), overwinter and pupate in May of the following year.

swell

literature

  • Tom Tolman, Richard Lewington: The butterflies of Europe and Northwest Africa , Franckh-Kosmos Verlags-GmbH & Co, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-440-07573-7
  • Hans-Josef Weidemann: Butterfly: observe, determine , Naturbuch-Verlag Augsburg 1995, ISBN 3-89440-115-X

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Tom Tolman, Richard Lewington: The butterflies of Europe and Northwest Africa , Franckh-Kosmos Verlags-GmbH & Co, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-440-07573-7
  2. ↑ Hans-Josef Weidemann: Butterfly: observe, determine , Naturbuch-Verlag, Augsburg 1995, ISBN 3-89440-115-X

Web links

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