YEAR LIST,
2010
For previous years' lists and commentaries, often incomplete, click: 2009; 2008; 2007; 2006; 2005; 2004; 2003; 2002; 2001. I seem to have
lost the file for 2000.
Two of my friends also keep online year-lists. Tim Cowles,
living in the Monts du Lyonnais, publishes his list HERE
and Matthew Rowlings, who lives not far from me in Vevey, Switzerland,
has his HERE.
SCROLL DOWN for the 2010 CHECKLIST or use the menu below to jump to the
COMMENTARY for each month.
CHECKLIST
FOR THE YEAR 2010
(All place names refer to localities near Villars-sur-Ollon,
Switzerland, unless otherwise specified or obvious)
Commentary
(Links in the
commentary are to pictures of the particular butterflies referred to)
January
16th: I went hairstreak egg hunting in the Rhône Valley on what turned out to be a bitterly cold day. This shows how cold it was in the woods! But the day was successful. I found about half a dozen brown hairstreak eggs at one site, and a single egg at another (this is a closer view of that egg), where I hadn't found them before. Some of them were tightly jammed into forks in the branches and all were at least near forks. There were also plenty of purple hairstreak eggs to be seen on low-growing sprigs of oak. Here are two together on the same twig, and here another two on a different twig. Here is another purple hairstreak egg. While looking for brown hairstreak eggs I found this egg, which I have not yet identified. These strange objects have nothing to do with butterflies, and I haven't identified them either!
17th:
Grim weather - wet, cold, foggy. I took a walk to my local woods to see
if I could find white-letter hairstreak eggs. When I got there I
realised I couldn't identify wych elm in winter, with thick snow on the
ground, and so no hope of finding leaves. Nevertheless, walking home I
did check some oak trees and found this purple hairstreak egg (and here). It is my first evidence of purple hairstreak in the region (I moved here in November 2008), so was very pleasing.
23rd: A warm, sunny day in the Rhône Valley, but no butterflies were flying even in the hot spots. I had another look for purple hairstreak eggs and again found plenty. I didn't notice it at the time, but there are two eggs on the sprig in the background in this photo. Here and here are others, and here is one laid, unusually, away from the bud.
24th: More purple hairstreak egg-hunting, this time in the oaks around Huémoz. I found plenty of eggs, on many different trees in the same region where I found one on 17th. In addition to healthy eggs I found two that had been parasitised (and here). They were on different trees. I am told that the parasite is most likely to be a tiny wasp of the genus Trichogramma.
The wasp eggs are laid through the micropyle (the pore in the central
depression of the egg) and the large hole in the side of the eggs is
the exit passage of the wasp.
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December