Insects of the Alicante Mountains (Part 1)

Insects of the Alicante Mountains (Part 1)

As promised here is my new entry to this blog that I hope that everyone that has visited is enjoying. Last time I gave a bit of information on the Eagles that we have in the area (the ones that we usually see while on route), failing to mention the Booted eagle, since I have never been able to spot it up to date. This time I am going to give a bit of information on the insect life in the area. All of these photo’s I have identified myself, using various Collins reference books. If anyone has anything to add or to correct, it would be of great help.

Following alphabetical order, here are some of the butterflies, moths and insects that can be found in the mountains of Alicante:

Arctia Tigrina

This little moth has only been spotted once in over 3 years, it is called Arctia Tigrina, and it is surprising we haven’t found more of them, since they live in stony and rocky habitats up to 1600 meters, making this area the perfect place for them (in later posts I will talk more about the area and its geography). The best time to be able to find these moths is from April to July. In this picture we found the moth in July, so it was at the end of it life. Descriptions found say that it is found from the Northern half of the Iberian Peninsula into Southern France.

Blue Butterfly

Blue Butterfly

A very common butterfly in the Alicante Mountains are the Blue butterflies, in this case I won’t get into too much detail, since there are so many different kinds of blues, and in most cases are very difficult to identify unless you catch them and study them. So I can say the ones that we have identified over the years, since we have seen hundreds of them, and in some cases you can find large number in one place, with maybe 6 different kinds all mixed in. I have to say that the one that has always been my favourite is the Adonis Blue, because of its very bright blue colouring on the centre of the wings. All of the blues have very similar markings under wing, and in some cases can only be told apart from one tiny marking somewhere on the wing. As you can imagine, it is extremely hard to identify them properly from just taking photos. Anyway, the ones that we have seen over the years are: Small Blue, Mazarine Blue, Adonis Blue, Baton Blue.

Blue Butterfly

Another thing about these butterflies, most of the females are a dark brown colour, and can easily be mistaken for Copper butterflies, I myself learned that lesson the hard way. Most the time if you find Blues and what you think are Coppers flying with them, they are female Blues.

Blue Darter Dragonfly

Here we have a Blue Darter. Over the warmer months in the Alicante Mountains we can find a huge variety of Dragonflies at any point where we encounter water. This kind we have only encountered a few times, but there is a large population of other dragonflies. I took my time to photograph this one (no my best picture I have to say), since it was staying rather still and not all dragonflies have such bright and distinctive colours to them.

Brown Mountain Grasshopper

This little guy being blinded by the sun is a Brown Mountain Grasshopper. Females can grow to be twice the size of the males and in both cases neither of them have functional wings, the ones that you will usually spot are the females, since the males can hop away easily, the females being twice the size just crawly along the ground, also unlike the rest of grasshoppers, these ones have no song at all, so if it’s singing, it’s not a Brown Mountain Grasshopper.

White-tailed Bumble Bee

Over the spring here we have a large number of Bumble Bees flying around. In this case I managed to capture a White-tailed Bumble Bee, very common over the whole or Europe. The curious thing about these members of the Wasp family is that only the queens hibernate over winter, and in spring start a new colony. It could be another kind, since there are various kinds that are similar.

Cecada

Now these are annoying little creatures, the Cicada, with luck they stay mostly down on the coast and annoy the hell out of people calling out none stop from palm trees, but it has to be said, we do get the odd one out and about in the country side. The funny thing is that these creatures live as larvae round the roots of trees until they transform into what you can see in the photo, climb the tree, and then sing while temperatures are high, doing so until the drop from the tree and die. Not the most exciting life one could have.

Clouded Yellow Butterfly

Here we have the Clouded Yellow butterfly, very common in the Alicante Mountains, in flight can easily be confused with a Brimstone butterfly, since the colour of the clouded yellow can be greenish and we have also seen some Brimstones that are closer to yellow in colour than green. We manage to see these butterflies mostly in woodland and shaded areas among pine trees, the reason being that the plants they prefer to feed off usually grow in this kind of terrain. Most guides show these butterflies as only being in flight from April to November, but in this area, depending on the weather over the winter, we can find them flying almost all year round, like the Swallowtail and Scarce Swallowtail.

Two-tailed Pasha Butterfly

And last but not least for today, we have the Two-Tailed Pasha. This butterfly has only been seen and photographed once on one of our holidays at www.mountainwalks.com, and was found almost on the peak of Sierra Plans, it was unlucky that on that day I had the small camera with me, so I did not manage to get a good photo, as you can see. But here is a link (worth having a look) to a photo taken by one of our guests. This has to be the most spectacular butterfly we have seen on route, it’s a shame that we have only seen it once in all the years we have been here. Descriptions say that it can be found in coastal regions up to 800m, well this one must have been lost since we were at about 1100 meters and in the Mountains of Alicante. It’s worth keeping an eye out for this one. If you get a fast blur of black and orange flying past you, it will be this large butterfly, being of up to 9cm wingspan.

There is a lot more I can post, but for this week I think it will be enough, next time I will post more details on some of the creatures you can find in the mountains of Alicante, like Gatekeeper butterflies, Oil beetles, Crickets and Moroccan Orangetips.

Thanks again for reading,

Tom

www.mountainwalks.com

Eagles of the Alicante Mountains

Short toed Eagle

Well, my name is Tom, I'm 29 and for almost 22 years now I have lived in Spain, in the Alicante mountains. I have started this blog (a new adventure for me, but hey, it's probably similar to facebook and other social media) to write and explain a bit about what I do, and the things that can be found while out and about in the Alicante mountains with Mountain Walks Spain S.L. (this is the company I am currently working at, if anyone is interested you can get more information on our website www.mountainwalks.com). For years and year i was very interested in wildlife, I lost the interest until I started working as a guide and little by little, have regained interest. I just hope that what I can share with people via this blog is of interest to all. If anyone wants to comment after reading please do, at this stage it can only help me write better entries.

Today being the first day I am doing this, and also with it being the time of year that most eagles are breeding, also in some surprising cases even migrating back into the area from Africa a few months early. This is the case of the Short toed Eagle, seen in the photo above (I will also say that all the photos that I put on this blog are photos that have been taken by me in person, and if not, will only be published with permission of the guest that took the photo while staying with MountainWalks). These fantastic birds can be seen in the Alicante mountains when temperatures start to rise after winter has passed, it is not rare to see one soaring above you in the valley where we are based (Vall de Seta), if you are lucky enough you can get a very good display since they eat while in flight to minimize danger to being attacked by potential predators on the ground, if you manage to see this it is possible to have the eagle circling overhead for anything up to 20 minutes. The photo above was taken in September 2013 and I am hoping to be able to get even better photos as years go by.

Golden Eagle in flight

Golden Eagle pearched on the rock face
(photo taken using binoculars for extra zoom)

Another kind of eagle we get more than often while out walking the dramatic and spectacular mountains of Alicante is the Golden eagle, even though we see them almost on a weekly basis and maybe more than once in the same week, they are very fast flyers, and it has been extremely difficult to photograph them. Here are a couple of the pictures we have been able to take over the years. Light conditions are the distance they usually keep makes it very hard for a good shot. But it does have to be said, when they put on a show, they really do put on a show for us on the walks. We have had Golden eagles flying overhead for up to 40 minutes in some occasions, and if they are with their young it makes for an even better display, depending on the age of the offspring the parents will let it fly with them or you can get a display at high-speed mid air of two adult Golden eagles mobbing their young (this happens when they reach the age to leave the nest, and we have been able to see twice over the last 3 years). Being the largest of eagles in the Alicante mountains, it is easy to identify them even if it is at a long distance, also because out of the eagles that we see the most in the area (being the three that I am going to mention today) it does not have any white under wing like the Short toed eagles or the rare Bonelli's eagle, unless it is a young one, then in that case its under wing can be similar to that of the Bonelli's at first sight, the size usually lets you identify young Golden eagles correctly.

Bonelli's eagle in flight

So, last but not least, we get to Europes most rare eagle, and in the Alicante mountains there is a high population of them and more than once can be seen flying in pairs. The colouring on these eagles is like a mix of that of the Golden eagle and the Short toed eagle. IT may be rare, but we get to see a good amount of them in the area, and we hope that anyone that comes on any of our walks gets a great view of these majestic birds.

For today this is all the time I have to be able to put this together, I wish I could go on forever about these birds, and about the area in general. But for now it's time to continue on other things. And I also promise to make the blogs more interesting in the future. It's just a case of improving over time.

Going to think on what to write about next.

Thanks for reading,

Tom Fagg

MountainWalks.com