Painted Lady
Vanessa cardui (=Cynthia cardui)
Recognise!
Similar to the Admiral, the Painted Lady has black and white dotted forewing tips. However, it does have an orange base colour with black markings. From the underside, the Painted Lady can be easily recognized due to its eyespots on the hindwings. The colours on these butterflies are often faint, owing to the fact that some scales are lost when undertaking the long and tough migration journey.
Did you know?
The Painted Lady is a migrating butterfly. It reproduces here in the summer, then in autumn it flies over the Alps into the Mediterranean area to hibernate. Those butterflies that attempt to hibernate in central Europe, will most often die. Thistles are an important food source for the caterpillars.
Source: "Schmetterlinge entdecken, beobachten, bestimmen. Die 150 häufigsten tagaktiven Arten Mitteleuropas.“ Seggewiße & Wymann, Haupt Verlag.
Photo: Simone Schneider