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For several days I participated in a annual counting of Poplar Admiral, organized with our mostwestern National Park, called Õrség NP and project-manager Szabolcs Safian, one of our most active butterfly-conservationist. There were about 20 people involved in the annual counting and we tried to check all the available habitats of the western border. However we had some bed days with severe storms, we counted about 5-6 Poplar Admirals. Unfortunatelly numbers are going down years by years as a result of abnormal forest management, groundwater loss and climate warming, also the species' foodpland is considered to be a kind of a pest among foresters. Used to be we had records from all over the northeastern hills, western border, even there was a 1899 record from Budapest, but now we only have probably 3-4 viable populations. On this count we also got news from 2 specimens from Sopron, and an exceptional record of 22 from the NE, Josvafo area. Apart from the Admirals there were enormous numbers of other good species, including mass of Lesser Purple Emperors, Black-veined Whites, Maps, several Fritillaries, incl. the gorgeous Lesser Marbled, False Heath and Assmann's, tonns of Large and Scarce Coppers, and even two Small Tortoiseshell. We also have seen a mass gradation of Green Club-tailed Dragonflies and Beautifull Demoiselle. Of course every day was finished with light-trapping and very memorable night-outs:)
10 June, 2009

The annual counting team discussing results at the first morning.


The largest butterfly of Eastern Europe, the incredibly gorgeous Poplar Admiral. I first encountered this species in 1989, when I was 17, and still remember the complete shock I got from the beauty of this beast. Archive photo by Szabolcs Safian.

Lesser Purple Emperors were everywhere, f. clytie mixed with the nominate form.

The same specimen from another angle.

Lesser Marbled Fritillary. Restricted to the NE and the Western border of Hungary. We also have historical specimens from Vertes Hills, and one from the Kiskunsag NP.

False Heath Fritillary. Probably my favourite Fritillary, incredibly elegant, lets say, glamorous.

We have seen probably hundreds of Large Coppers everywhere. Well... Better to say thousands! Really!

... same story we had with Scarce Coppers.

During my childhood time I never really gave attention for Small Tortoiseshell, it was so common. Today??? No question, I would pay for it! On this tour we have got two.

Every night we had lightrapping. It would be too long to give a list, but we were very happy with the large number of Diachrysia zosimi, one of our most attractive owlet moth.

Finally a shoot about the loveliest moment of the whole tour...

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