A Patriotic sort of Butterfly

[trehopr1]

Here is what I call my "Patriot Butterfly". I acquired it about 10 years ago from a small
collection of about 10 drawers I had heard was being sold. The fellow who owned the 
collection was a small time breeder of various butterfly species who did a descent buisness
selling his stock off to small butterfly houses for several years.
In the process, he began to set aside various "series" of some of the species he had worked
with showing the success of his sorted efforts; and perhaps to show potential clients what 
they could receive from him. Anyway, because his passion was related more with breeding
than collecting; he never built up a very big collection.
When I had chance to peruse it I happened upon a small series of 11 specimens of this cross
he had made between a White Admiral (male) and a Red-Spotted Purple (female).That is:
(Basilarchia arthemis X Basilarchia astyanax).
Of the lot, this specimen was unequivocally the apex or zenith of this crossbreeding effort. As
you can see there is lots of white and blue present but, the additional bold red spots on this
specimen were like no other; giving this red, white, and blue butterfly a very Patriotic flair....

[Paul K]

Limenitis (Basilarchia) arthemis is a very interesting and variable species.
Below are few specimens of different subspecies from few locations in Canada.  



Paul

[exoticimports]

I’ve not seen astyanax on this side of the lake.

[trehopr1]

Wow Paul, those are nice! A couple of those arthemis are spectacular wild captures... also wearing red, white, and blue. And that astyanax on the bottom right is awesome with all that red it has. I've never caught any astyanax quite like that one.