DIURNI AT REAZZIXO NEAR LOCARNO. 



85 



of June 25th, 27th, 28th, and July 2ntl. My hope was that as the 

 season was late, I might be in time for the spring brood of Melitaea 

 hritoiiiartix. The species was fairly plentiful, but very worn, and 

 though I netted some dozens, only three males and five females were 

 worth bringing home. I tried in vain to obtain eggs from some worn 

 females, and think the failure was probably due to the fact that they 

 were too wasted, and the better specimens I was loath to risk. What 

 struck me most was the very large variety of insects it was possible to 

 obtain in an hour or two, remembering, of course, that collecting here 

 differed from two hours' mountain entomologising, in that it was all 

 done at the same altitude. The weather, too, was broken and uncertain, 

 and the season decidedly backward. The list of insects observed or 

 captured is, I think, sufficiently long to be of interest, for, though 

 Reazzino has been often visited, I do not know that a record has been 

 made of its butterflies at midsummer. My own visits to the locality 

 have always been made in the late summer. M. bnto)iiartis is, I should 

 say, fairly common, but not abundant. In habit it seems to be a less 

 active flyer than M. othalia, and to fly persistently at a lower level, 

 keeping very near the ground, and preferring the sides of ditches 

 and the edge of the marshes which lie under the hills of that part. 

 On the other hand, the only other butterfly that I particularly wanted 

 — Scolitanti(}ex orion — has a predilection for the dry ground and rocks 

 just above the path which skirts the clifl's. It never, or rarely, comes 

 down with the other "blues" to damp places on the road. I have 

 noticed the same peculiarity in the Val Strona, Val Anzasca, and at 

 Crevola. This species was in magnificent condition, and mostly very 

 large, and with a much more brilliant orange band, and more heavily 

 marked with black on the underside than in the autumn brood, which 

 I have taken here. But here there were small examples hardly more 

 than three-fourths the size of the giants which appeared to be normal 

 for the spring brood. Thus the measurements ranged from 35mm. to 

 25mm. in both sexes. Arijynnis adippe was almost without exception, 

 in the males, var. deodo.va, in the pink of perfection. One very 

 beautiful specimen has the underwings of a dark, but bright, ochre 

 colour, instead of the usual strong primrose tint. And this colour lies 

 uniformhj over the whole surface of the disc of the wings, only broken 

 by the veining, i.e., there are no lighter spots, or faint green shading 

 as in others. The same colour is also reproduced on the tips of the 

 upperwings. This distinction is difflcult to describe, but it is very 

 apparent when the specimen is seen in a series. The females had 

 hardly emerged ; I took one fine typical example. I ought, perhaps, to 

 add that Mclitaeo rt^/m/m was generally remarkably tine, both as to size 

 and colouring. This is interesting, because Mr. Wheeler, to whom the 

 specunens were submitted, notices it with surprise in the first number 

 of the Entoniolofiist for this year. He knows Reazzino as well as any- 

 one, and M. othalia better than most, and his experience of specimens 

 from Cadenabbia and Reazzino, had led him to the conclusion that 

 they confirmed the opinion of Riihl and other Swiss authors, that 

 there is a tendency in this species to decrease in size in Tessin, and the 

 south of the Alps generally. The following is a complete list of the 

 butterflies observed at Reazzino, June 25th-July 2nd, 1909: — 

 Urbicolides. — hlnjnnis althaeae, Hesperia alreu.^ var. fritilliim, fJ. 

 inalrae, Ani/iade.'i .fylranu.'i. Ruralides. — Callnphnja rubi, Heodes. 



