Male, July 2012, Switzerland

Male, Switzerland, August 2016

Male, Switzerland, August 2013

Male, July 2012, Switzerland



Male, July 2012, Switzerland



Male, July 2012, Switzerland



Male, July 2012, Switzerland



Male, July 2012, Switzerland

Female, Switzerland, August 2012



Female, Switzerland, August 2012



Female, Switzerland, August 2012

Female, Switzerland, August 2012

Courting couple, male on left, Switzerland, August 2012



A glimpse of the upperside



Distribution - but note there are many more 'holes' in the distribution than are apparent here

The hermit is a grayling of hot, dry grassy areas, usually among mountains, in central and southern Europe. In the northern parts of its range it is declining and many former colonies have become extinct. In Switzerland it is now an extreme rarity, on the border of extinction. This is mostly or entirely due to urbanisation and other changing land use in the few critical areas where it once flew. All the pictures above were taken at one of its last remaining localities. Further south and east the species is not threatened and may be common.

The uppersides of this  butterfly are dark with broken white bands, easily visible in flight. However, like most graylings it rarely or never settles with this surface exposed but folds its wings above its back. The last picture above is of a flying butterfly, just to illustrate the pattern and colour scheme. The male underside is distinctive and unmistakable. The female, which is larger, has more or less obvious shadows of the same markings - sometimes strong enough to resemble the male, sometimes effectively invisible, so the hindwing appears pale beige. As soon as she flies, she betrays herself as a hermit, by the upperside pattern. The much scarcer southern hermit, which flies locally in Spain and Morocco, has a similar upperside (though the male has a buff sex brand on the forewing) but a quite different underside, with the veins highlighted in white to give the appearance of a network.

The butterfly frequents hot, dry, grassy slopes, where it spends a lot of time sitting around - first with the folded wings flat on to the sun then, as the day warms up, with them edge on. I observed a courtship consisting of two butterflies sitting and gazing into each other's eyes for over two hours - but while I was off doing something else they moved away and I missed the culmination. The foodplants are various grasses, including bromes and fescues. Adults are said to fly from May to October in a single brood, depending on altitude and latitude. In Switzerland, they fly from July. They hibernate as caterpillars.