How to put butterflies in triangular envelopes properly

[Adam Cotton]

Very often I see butterflies that have been put into triangles incorrectly, so I decided to post the method here. The most important issue here is protecting the antennae from breaking, which is actually quite easy to do just by putting the butterfly in the envelope correctly when fresh.

Many years ago I created a series of photos as a picture guide of the right and wrong way to do it, and decided to post these pictures here for everyone to see.

Here's the right way:




Note that the antennae lie along the strong costal edge of the forewings, and as a result are well protected. It is very easy to put a butterfly into the envelope in this way. Open the envelope and hold that in one hand Next pick up the butterfly holding it with wings closed by the thorax on either side of the wing bases facing head down. The antennae will normally point forwards and down. Put the butterfly into the envelope with the head somewhere near the middle of the long edge and slide it along so that the head is near a corner and the forewing edges lie along the fold of the triangle and close the envelope. The sliding action moves the antennae into the correct position. Don't forget to put the data onto the envelope!

Adam.

[Adam Cotton]

Here's a photo to show the wrong way to put butterflies in envelopes:

[Adam Cotton]

And here's what often happens when butterflies are incorrectly put in:

[Deleted]

There is nothing more infuriating when you have payed a lot of money for a specimen or waited a long time for it to arrive than to open the envelope and find it damaged through incorrect packing so lets hope some dealers read this post and do it properly. One of the worst ways of papering specimens is the method used by some dealers of stapling clear plastic to a cardboard base, the staples being so close to the wings it makes removal without damage impossible. I recently obtained around 250-300 specimens of British butterflies that had been papered 20 years ago, around 60% were damaged due to this exact cause, it gets boring glueing antenna back on after setting so many specimens, uncreasing tails or gluing wings back on when it could so easily have been avoided.

[xavm (Xavier)]

I hate receiving butterflies put in triangle envelopes: in 90+% butterflies arrive damaged.

I prefer to use the squared envelopes and put butterflies in a soft tissue Inside.

BW, XavM

[deliasfanatic]

I'll add that folded tissue should be placed inside the envelope, regardless of shape, especially with larger specimens. I can't count the number of times that I've received specimens that have been damaged by sliding inside their envelopes, crushing wing edges and tails, because they were placed loose into envelopes.

[wollastoni]

Triangular envelopes are better than squared envelopes to protect the antennaes, but indeed there are 2 secrets to be 100%safe :
- body parallele to the larger side
- folded tissue inside the envelope to deter specimen from moving inside the envelope (It also help avoid greasing on freshly collected specimens)