The most significant butterfly
discovery of the last probably 75 years just happened
on the very same day when I visited the Woodland Brown site,
see bellow. On that night my fellow mate, Szabolcs Fabian
called my on Skype and informed about the incredible discovery
of a giant population of False
Ringlet (Coenonympha oedippus) in
the Hansag area, performed by dr. Andras Ambrus, our good
friend, zoological supervisor of the Ferto-Hansag NP. However
I have seen the species in several times, I was completely
shocked by the excitement. This species is extremely rare
around, we have had only one small population near Ocsa, Budapest,
which is on the brink of extinction soon, as a result of habitat
degradation. We had some old records from the Hansag area,
so the discovery wasn't unexpected. In 1908 Marton Holtz,
collector of Walter Rotschild collected six specimens near
Csorna village, along with Rhyparioides metelkanus,
a beautiful moth, discovered also here in Hungary (1855).
Later Frigyes Graeser collected False Ringlets again in Hansag
between 1933-1936. Also we had single records from areas around
Budapest, incl. Romaifurdo, Budaors, Szar, Peszer, etc. This
discovery by Andras made a major excitement between all of
us, and I was privileged with him when got the invitation
to see newly discovered population, which is of course need
extreme secrecy as a result of illegal collecting activities.
20 July, 2009
The extraordinary False Ringlet, discovered after 75 years
in the Hansag area, NW of Hungary, our second population in
the country.
Dr. Andras Ambrus, who discovered the species made a capture-recapture
transect and marked about 150 specimens. We estimate the population
for about a 1000 specimen large.
The False Ringlet's habitat holds also one of the largest
Large Chequered Skipper population I have ever seen, definitely
we can talk about thousands. Here a male displaying for a
female.
At night we tried to find the legendary Rhyparioides metelkanus.
However we failed, still we find some extreme rarities of
our fauna, incl. Arenostola phragmititis (Noctuidae)...
and Chariaspilates formosarius (Geometridae).
Back to the News >>>
|
