Friday, July 16, 2010

Non-White Admiral

This White Admiral was at Fermyn Woods, Northants last Sunday (11.7.10). I am not sure it is one of the unusual aberrant forms or just rather worn, but you can see it lacks the black and orange colour (though it did have an angle-dependent shimmer) and the white colouring is very poorly represented.
Any ideas?


1 comment:

sarah said...

I'm not an expert but this looks like the obliterae form, whose white markings are considerably reduced. Apparently this can be produced by chilling, and in the wild may be produced from caterpillars that pupate in frost pockets (Thomas & Lewington. 2010). Possibly a result of the very cold winter?