Tags
Anthocharis cardamines, British butterflies, butterfly, Orange-tip, Orange-tip butterfly, spring butterflies
If there is one butterfly whose male makes a truly conspicuous effort to impress the female of the species, then it must surely be the Orange-tip (Anthocharis cardamines). Those vivid orange wing tips are hard to miss, even when the males are speeding past at a hundred miles an hour. Today, at last, I saw my first Orange-tip for 2020 – in fact, I spotted four of these handsome chaps and, after following a couple back and forth along their chosen territories, I finally managed a single photo of one as it was refuelling.
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Well done on getting such an excellent photo. Are the females just white then? Saw about four orange tips, several small whites, peacocks and small tortoishells today. X
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What a great variety you saw – lovely!
Female Orange-tips are mostly white above, with dark tips to their upper wings, but have a mottled greenish pattern on their underwings, just like the males.
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Very striking.
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They certainly are. Thanks. 🙂
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