Dark Green Fritillary

Speyeria aglaja

The dark green fritillary is a species of butterfly in the family Nymphalidae. The insect has a wide range in the Palearctic ecozone - Europe, Morocco, Iran, Siberia, Central Asia, China, Korea and Japan.
Dark Green Fritillary Butterfly (Argynnis aglaja) Tonight on the southern coastline of the UK, it was dark at 8pm and already I'm pining for the fjords...... I mean, for the long summer evenings spent in wild meadows around Brighton, surrounded by hordes of butterflies, one of the most striking being the Dark Green Fritillary. 

Widespread, but not always easy to find as they don't tend to be seen in rural areas. Certainly not in a significant numbers.

Watch them close up in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4f7j9CZ7pg Dark Gree,Geotagged,Speyeria aglaja,Summer,United Kingdom

Appearance

The large fritillary is fiery reddish yellow above, the basal area of the male being always duller.

The markings are constant: a black margin, a row of deep black but thin marginal arcs, a very straight, central row of dots, of which only the last one of the forewing is shifted distad; between this row of dots and the base there are six thin black transverse bands extending from the subcostal vein into the wing.

The underside of the hindwing is characteristic; it bears numerous silver-spots on a partly verdigris partly leather-yellow ground, but never a row of ocelli in the marginal area, as is the case in the forms of the Niobe fritillary and high brown fritillary.

Naming

*''S. a. aglaja'' Southern Europe, Central Europe, Caucasus, Altai, Sayan, West Siberia, South Siberia
⤷ ''S. a. borealis'' Europe, Siberia, Russian Far East, Kamchatka
⤷ ''S. a. lyauteyi'' Morocco
⤷ ''S. a. excelsior'' Morocco
⤷ ''S. a. ottomana'' Armenia, Talys, Kopet Dagh
⤷ ''S. a. gigasvitatha'' Tian-Shan, Ghissar, Darvaz, Alai, South Altai
⤷ ''S. a. vitatha'' Pamirs
⤷ ''S. a. clavimacula'' South Ussuri
⤷ ''S. a. kenteana'' Transbaikalia, North Ussuri, Amur
⤷ ''S. a. tonnai'' Sakhalin
⤷ ''S. a. bessa'' ?

References:

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Taxonomy
KingdomAnimalia
DivisionArthropoda
ClassInsecta
OrderLepidoptera
FamilyNymphalidae
GenusSpeyeria
SpeciesS. aglaja
Photographed in
United Kingdom