''Coenonympha tullia'', the large heath or common ringlet, is a

butterfly Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The group comprise ...

in the family

Nymphalidae The Nymphalidae are the largest family of butterflies, with more than 6,000 species distributed throughout most of the world. Belonging to the superfamily Papilionoidea, they are usually medium-sized to large butterflies. Most species have a red ...

. It flies in a variety of grassy habitats, including roadsides, woodland edges and clearings, prairies, bogs, and arctic and alpine taiga and tundra. It is a poor flyer, but can sometimes be found along ditches seeking new grounds. It is a

holarctic The Holarctic realm is a biogeographic realm that comprises the majority of habitats found throughout the continents in the Northern Hemisphere. It corresponds to the floristic Boreal Kingdom. It includes both the Nearctic zoogeographical reg ...

species found in northern Europe, east across the Palearctic and across North America. The species was first described by Otto Friedrich Müller in 1764.Common Ringlet
, Butterflies of Canada Successful reintroductions of the species to North West England took place in 2020, 2022 and 2023.

Description in Seitz

''C. tiphon'' Rott. (— ''davus'' F., ''tullia'' Hbn.) (48h). Upperside sandy yellow, similar to '' Coenonympha symphita'', rather duller; male without markings, female with the ocelli shining through. On the underside of the hindwing whitish smears are joined forming a more or less incomplete median band, beyond which there are some ocelli in the male and often a complete row in the female. In Central Europe, especially in the Alps, Central and Southern Germany and the Danube countries. — ''philoxenus'' Esp. (= ''rothliebi'' Stgr.) (48 h) is a rather large northern form, dulled with grey above and strongly ocellated below, from the continental shores of the North Sea and Great Britain, (said to have occurred also at Lemberg). — ab. ''laidion'' Bkh. is a slight deviation from the type, which is a little paler ochre-yellow on the upperside; it is probably found every-where exceptionally among the nymotypical form. -— ''isis'' Tnbg. (= ''demophile'' Fr.) (48h) has instead of a brown underside a grey one with fewer and smaller ocelli, and its upperside, which is absolutely without markings, is also of a greyish colour. Scandinavia, North Russia, as far as Central Asia. — ''viluiensis'' Mén. (= ''grisescens'' Christ.), from the Vilui river in Siberia and from the mountains of Werchojansk, north of Jakutsk, is on both sides bright grey, not yellow; the whitish median band of the underside of the hindwing shines through above and is shaded with grey towards the base; the base of the hindwing beneath washed with green. — ''caeca'' Stgr., from the Namangan Mts., is a small form without a trace of ocelli, so that it is superficially similar to '' pamphilus''. — ''mixturata'' Alp. is the most eastern form of the Old World, from Kamschatka, and is without ocelli on both sides, like the American ''ochracea'', but instead of being pale yellowish brown, like the latter, is pale grey above; on the underside the hindwing is grey, the forewing ochre yellow with a grey margin. — Across the Behring Sea, in Alaska, the species is represented by the closely allied form ''kodiak'' Edw. — The most western old-world form is ''scotica'' Stgr., which above has a dull grey ground-colour and dark edges. and beneath is without ocelli; from Ireland and Scotland. — ''subcaecata'' Ruhl, from the higher Altai, is an intermediate form, closely allied to ''ochracea'' from Colorado; it is darker and larger than ''caeca'', but paler than ''isis''; single specimens show vestiges of ocelli. — ''rhodopensis'' Elw. ow_''Coenonympha_rhodopensis''_Elwes,_1900_.html" ;"title="Coenonympha_rhodopensis.html" ;"title="ow ''Coenonympha rhodopensis">ow ''Coenonympha rhodopensis'' Elwes, 1900 ">Coenonympha_rhodopensis.html" ;"title="ow ''Coenonympha rhodopensis">ow ''Coenonympha rhodopensis'' Elwes, 1900 a form from the Danubian countries, closely allied to ''isis'', but yellowish brown on the upperside and rarely darker in the male.Of the ocelli on the underside only the pupil of the apical one and sometimes of one of the eyes on the hindwing shines through above. But on the underside of the hindwing this form mostly exhibits a complete row of ocelli, while in an otherwise closely related form, ''occupata'' Reb., they are entirely absent; the latter form occurs in Bosnia and Herzegovina. — Larva pale green, covered with minute dot-like warts, with a globular green head and yellow mouth, dark light-edged dorsal line, whitish subdorsal lines and pale yellow lateral stripe; anal claspers and anal fork rosy red. From September until May on rushes and reeds, such as Carex, Rhynchospora, Festuca, etc. Pupa pale green, abdomen whitish. — The butterflies are on the wing in June and July, singly, and on most flight-places not common. Sometimes quite fresh specimens are found in places where no single individual had been met with before in spite of decades of ardent collecting, and from where the species again disappeared for a long time. The flight-places are usually peat bogs and meadows flooded from time to time, according to Ruhl especially such on which Eriophorum grows.

Subspecies

In alphabetical order: * ''C. t. ampelos '' (W. H. Edwards, 1871) – northwest common ringlet * ''C. t. benjamini'' (McDunnough, 1928) – prairie ringlet * ''C. t. brenda'' * ''C. t. bosniae'' (Davenport, 1941) * ''C. t. columbiana'' (McDunnough, 1928) – ringlet * ''C. t. davus'' (Fabricius, 1777) * ''C. t. elko'' (W. H. Edwards, 1881) * ''C. t. elwesi'' (Davenport, 1941) * ''C. t. eryngii'' (H. Edwards, 1877) * ''C. t. eunomia'' (Dornfeld, 1967) * ''C. t. furcae'' (Barnes & Benjamin, 1926) * ''C. t. gliwa'' * ''C. t. haydenii'' (W. H. Edwards, 1872) – Hayden's common ringlet * ''C. t. inornata'' (W. H. Edwards, 1861) – inornate common ringlet * ''C. t. insulanus'' (McDunnough, 1928) – Vancouver ringlet * ''C. t. kodiak'' (W. H. Edwards 1869) – Kodiak ringlet * ''C. t. mackenziei'' (D. Davenport, 1936) – Mackenzie's ringlet * ''C. t. mcisaaci'' (dos Passos, 1935) – McIsaac's ringlet * ''C. t. mixturata'' (Alphéraky, 1897) * ''C. t. mono'' (Burdick, 1942) – (common) ringlet * ''C. t. ochracea'' (W. H. Edwards, 1861) – ochre (common) ringlet * ''C. t. polydama'' (Haworth, 1803) * ''C. t. pseudobrenda'' (Austin & R. Gray, 1998) * ''C. t. scotica'' (Staudinger, 1901) * ''C. t. sibirica'' (Davenport, 1941) * ''C. t. subfusca'' (Barnes & Benjamin, 1926) * ''C. t. suecica'' (Hemming, 1936) * ''C. t. tullia'' (Müller, 1764) – common ringlet * ''C. t. viluiensis'' (Ménétriés, 1859) * ''C. t. yontocket'' (Porter & Mattoon, 1989) – Yontocket satyr ringlet * ''C. t. yukonensis'' (W. Holland, 1900) – Yukon common ringlet Formerly a subspecies: * ''Coenonympha nipisiquit'' (McDunnough, 1939) – maritime ringlet * ''Coenonympha california'' (Westwood, 1851) – California ringlet For more information on subspecies and biology

Etymology

Named in the Classical tradition. The Specific epithet ''tullia'' is related to Tullia, daughter of

Servius Tullius Servius Tullius was the legendary sixth king of Rome, and the second of its Etruscan dynasty. He reigned from 578 to 535 BC. Roman and Greek sources describe his servile origins and later marriage to a daughter of Lucius Tarquinius Priscus, ...

, sixth Roman king, or daughter of

Marcus Tullius Cicero Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the esta ...

, orator, writer and jurist.

References

*Emmet, A.M., J. Heath et al. (Ed.), 1990. The Butterflies of Great Britain and Ireland. ''The Moths and Butterflies of Great Britain and Ireland'' Vol. 7 Part 1 (Hesperiidae to Nymphalidae). Harley Books, Colchester, UK. 370p. *Tomlinson, D. & R. Still, 2002. ''Britain's Butterflies''. WildGuides, Old Basing, UK. 192p.

External links

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