Saturday, March 16, 2013

Small Tortoiseshell and Élysée Treaty anniversary - a card from Germany


SMALL TORTOISESHELL 

Country: Germany
Place:  Montabaur
Received: 24/02/2013
Distance: 1 397 km
Travelled: 6 days


Small Tortoiseshell


The Small Tirtoiseshell (Aglais urticae L.) is a well-known colourful butterfly. It's scientific name, unticae, comes from the word "urtica" (nettle), because nettle is one of food plants for this species.

Élysée Treaty anniversary stamp

This joint stamp was issued by France and Germany to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Élysée Treaty, the landmark agreement between the two former enemies.

2 comments:

  1. Sadly the Small Tortoiseshell (once our most common coloured butterfly) has got quite scarce in Britain in recent years. Perhaps one reason is there are not so many sites of waste ground with nettles? People don't realise the wildlife value of some waste ground. They want to see it developed or cultivated. Oops, getting on one of my hobby horses...

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  2. Your hobby horse is totally ok with me :) You've remembered me of a story my mom told us when we were at school. My mom is a geography teacher (a headmaster of a gymnasium at the moment) and she used to teach me and my classmates for several years. Well, she told us about Pieridae butterflies - their color is white and they were perfectly protected while sitting themselves down on birch trees with white bark. But in Novopolotsk, which is 7 km away from my hometown, there is an oil plant and cars and all that smoke - it blaken the part of the trees, so butterflies lost their natural protection and a lot of them were eaten by birds.

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