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Small tortoiseshell

 

 

The brightly coloured new generation of the early spring herald of a “motley summer“ is flying about. In Estonia as well as in the whole of Europe, from the Mediterranean to the Arctic Ocean the small tortoiseshells belong to the most common butterflies.

 

Of course the recently hatched ones are more colourful than the generation that survived the winter as imagos, whose last and rather tattered representatives could still be encountered a month and half ago. The wingspan is 4-5 centimetres, and for some particularly large and beautiful specimens even more. The yellow spots are bright, at the front edge of the forewings three black patches, the outer edge of wings lightly crenelated and lined with blue dots, wing fringes black. A small tortoiseshell with closed wings looks like a ”dried leaf”.

 

This generation will go into hibernation as imagos  in September.

 

_{Estonian original 15.07.2014}