UK Butterflies
Building a Community of Responsible Butterfly Enthusiasts in Britain & Ireland
Building a Community of Responsible Butterfly Enthusiasts in Britain & Ireland
This page provides access to all named aberrations of a given species and Goodson & Read (1969) is a key resource in this regard.
Description to be completed.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk
This section contains those aberrations that are considered new, and have yet to be formally defined.
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The upperside showing a broad marginal band of brilliant green.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The upperside of the forewings normal. On the hindwings the transverse band is normal but the anal eye larger and surrounded by bright fulvous as are also the extreme points of the wings. The superior part of the hindwings, from the anterior border as far as the first marginal point, bright fulvous, the tint being prolonged into the clear antemarginal band.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The ground colour of the upperside is brilliant orange-fulvous marbled with brownish, the pattern normal. On the hindwings the base is brownish, slightly sanded with fulvous, the marginal band fulvous.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
On the upperside the eye of the forewings is visible in the form of an irregularly shaped brownish-black spot with a whitish point in the middle.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
On the upperside of the hindwings the spot towards the tornus of the hindwing lacks both the normal ferruginous [rust-coloured] patch surrounding it and also the whitish centre.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The normal violet reflections of the male are changed into pearly ones, tending more towards blue than violet.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The hindwings ornamented by three main fulvous lunules in the nervure SC+RI and M2 and an indication of a series of spots of which the fulvous ring of the ocellus forms a part.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The violet reflections are bluer than usual, more extensive and more persistent in almost all lights.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The light spaces are brilliant yellowish to more or less dark brown. From a Verity description.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The black designs dusted with golden scales, which are more dense on the hinder part. From a Verity description.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The upperside completely black-brown with a blue shimmer and no white markings.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Upperside of the forewings deep black with four small whitish obscured spots, two at the apex and two in the submargin. Hindwings deep black, the red ring spot hardly visible. The purple shimmer is retained but dark in tint. Underside of normal pattern but deep black and washed with grey.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings with three small white spots as in ab. afflicta Cabeau. These are in the form of a triangle, one apical, the second subapical and the third marginal. Hindwings with the white transverse band completely absent, one sees only some bluish hairs. There is no light antemarginal band and the eye at the anal angle is pupilled with bluish-grey.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Upperside wholly fuscous, shining with blue, except for two distinct white spots towards the apex of the forewings and an ocellus with rusty coloured iris towards the anal angle of the hindwings. Only differs from ab. corax Cabeau by its ground colour, which in corax is strongly black.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The ground colour of the upperside strongly black like the crow with a strong bluish reflection. Forewings with only two white spots, the apical and second marginal, the third is absent or almost so. Hindwings with no trace of the transverse band, only some hairs of bluish-grey. The anal eye is not pupilled.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Hindwings like ab. iole Schiffermüller on the upperside, with no transverse white band, but the forewings carrying six little whitish or greyish spots, very little visible.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Hindwings upperside with the median white band reduced to one white spot, the most inferior one, the rest browned over and almost effaced. Forewings like ab. transtenuata Cabeau which has the white spots a little smaller than in the typical form.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings with only three little white spots in the form of a triangle, the apical, subapical and second marginal. Hindwings without a clear marginal band or one scarcely indicated, the transverse band reduced to two or three little white spots, sometimes greyish, in the lower part of the wing, the upper spots being list in the ground colour. Also belonging to this form, specimens with the forewings spots, apart from those mentioned above, showing in greyish but the hindwings band is always reduced as above. The figure in Lamb.30.pl.3.f.1 shows the forewings with seven whitish spots so presumably the form is mainly characterised by the absence of a complete white band on the hindwings.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Like ab. afflicta Cabeau.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The ground colour brownish-black, darker than normal. Forewings with three to six very small white spots, mostly of a greyish tint. Hindwings with the white transverse band much reduced, composed of two or three little white spots in the lower part of the wings, the upper ones are brownish-grey and sunk into the ground colour. The anal ocellus are large and pupilled whitish-grey or blue.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings with the white spots a little smaller than normal. Hindwings with the spots of the median white band very much reduced and isolated. The submarginal band strongly divided by neural rays of reddish-brown.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings with three or four whitish or greyish spots, namely the subapical one and one or two of the submarginal. Hindwings with the median band formed by five inferior spots but reduced in size, clearly separated, and obscured, by the sixth costal spot effaced or almost so.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings with five or six little white spots, very small, those near the margin only are clear and white and larger than the others. Hindwings with the white band more reduced than in ab. stictica Cabeau, which has a very narrow band composed of five or six separated spots.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
= semi-iole Frohawk.Vars.Brit.Butts.1938.p.107.pl.25.figs.1-2.
Forewings with only five little white spots of which the apical one is almost effaced and the three irregular spots above the inner margin are absent. Hindwings normal. The figure in Lamb.30.pl.1.f.2 shows only three white spots on the forewings and a normal complete white band on the hindwings. Presumably this is the main character the spots much reduced on the forewings but all present on the hindwings. The figure of Frohawk's semi-iole is almost identical.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
= tetrica Cabeau.Rev.Mens.Soc.Ent.Nam.1910.p.33.
Esper's figure shows the forewings with only three white spots, a small apical one and two tiny ones below it. Hindwings with a transverse row of five white spots, the costal one being effaced. Verity, rightly or wrongly, makes this a synonym of iole Schiffermüller because in his text Esper calls it the spotless form, he refers however to his figure which has white spots on both fore and hindwings. Cabeau's tetrica has the forewings with three little white spots, the two apical and the first marginal. Hindwings with the band composed of five narrow white spots.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings somewhat paler than the type [typical form] with eight or nine white spots, very small and clearly separated. The white band of the hindwings is very narrow, composed of four or five white spots separated by the black nervures, which are pronounced. The other spots are greyish and sunk into the ground colour.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings usually with only nine white spots, smaller and not confluent. Hindwings with the white transverse band complete but narrower.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Forewings showing only three white spots which are small, the apical, subapical and second marginal. The left hindwing with only four little whitish-grey spots in place of the transverse band, the right hindwing without any at all, the band being replaced by some bluish hairs.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The pattern of the white spots is intensified on the upperside. The band of the hindwings is broader and the light spots on the inner-margin of the forewings and on the margin of the hindwings are strikingly larger, the latter, in the male, much clearer and larger than in the type [typical form].
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The inward curve of the outline of the forewings below the apex is not developed, its edge being straight from the apex to the tornus.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Male of normal coloration but the wing radius at least 1.7 inches [43.18mm], the size of the normal female.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
= iriella Cabeau.(name misspelled).Rev.Mens.Soc.Ent.Nam.1910.p.32.
A third smaller in size than normal.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
Verity's figure shows the underside with the areas normally chestnut, darkened by black dusting so that they appear blackish-brown.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
The underside of the forewings without a trace of the white band, the ocellus virtually normal. There are two white subapical spots and the ground colour is deep blackish-brown. On the underside of the hindwings the light band is virtually normal in extent but heavily peppered with the bluish-black scaling. The basal third of the wing is bluish-grey, the middle third, except for the light band, rich deep chestnut, the terminal third grey, faintly suffused with light chestnut, and the terminal margin bluish-grey. The colour areas are sharply contrasted. The upperside is ab. lugenda Cabeau.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
On the underside there is no trace of the normal ocelli. The normal white bands are wholly extinct, that of the hindwings being replaced as described below. The terminal third of fore and hindwings is in the main brown-grey without any ferruginous [rust-coloured] shading, but with a broken very slightly darker sub-marginal band. There is a brown patch at the apex of the forewings. There is a black mark and a brown patch at the tornus of the hindwings. The central third of both wings is occupied by a dull chestnut band, which loses itself towards the tornus of the hindwings. On the hindwings this chestnut area has, extending along its middle and corresponding generally in position to the normal broad white band, a narrow broken buff band. The iris ‘tooth-mark’ is discernible. A vague impression of this buff band is continued into the forewings in the direction of the apex and not along the line normally occupied by the normal white forewing markings. The basal third of both wings and a wide area along the dorsum of the hindwings are brownish-grey, shaded with ferruginous, and for the most part merging into the central chestnut area. No white patch in the basal half of the subcosta of the forewings but the normal black marks are present, nor any white mark, except just below the apical brown patch. There is black shading on all wings and a slight smokiness of the whole, resulting in a blurring of definition of the colour areas and a general dulling effect. There is a slightly bluish tinge in some of the lighter areas. The upperside is full ab. iole Schiffermüller. It is doubtful whether an underside should have a different name from its upperside. Schiffermüller did not describe the underside of iole but it may be assumed that it was aberrant, as Heslop's specimen, and possibly identical.
Natural History Museum
britishbutterflyaberrations.co.uk (all aberrations)
