Damselflies

Copper demoiselle

Menorca has eight species of damselflie, some spectacular like the male Copper demoiselle above or the more cryptic Winter damselfly pictured below.

Family Calopterygidae (Demoiselles)

• Calopteryx haemorrhoidalis. Copper demoiselle, Locally abundant in the right habitat by flowing water.

Winter damselfly

Family Lestidae (Emerald damselflies or spreadwings)

• Sympecma fusca, Winter damselfly. Can be found in the winter months as S. fusca overwinters as an adult.
• Lestes viridis (Chalcolestes viridis), Willow emerald damselfly. Locally abundant.
• Lestes barbarus, Southern emerald damselfly. Scarce.

Family Coenagrionidae (Blue, blue-tailed & red damselflies)

• Ischnura elegans, Blue-tailed damselfly. Common all over the island.
• Ceriagrion tenellum, Small red damselfly. Local
• Coenagrion caerulescens, Mediterranean bluet. Very rare
• Erythromma lindenii (Cercion lindenii), Blue-eye, also called the Goblet-marked Damselfly.

Amphibians and Reptiles

Italian Wall Lizard

Menorca has 13 species of reptiles and amphibians. An excellent report of a field trip to Menorca by an expert in hepatology can be found in the
 The European Ampibia and Reptile blog
field trip report. This report has a lot of interesting stuff and much of the info in this blog is derived from it. I advise you to read Matt Wilson original account.

 The specied found on Menorca are

• Green toad (Bufo viridis ssp balearicus)
• Stripeless tree frog (Hyla meridionalis)
• Hermanns tortoise (Testudo hermanni)
• European pond terrapin (Emys orbicularis)
• American red-eared slider (Trachemys scripta)
• Italian wall lizard (Podarcis siculus)
• Moroccan rock lizard (Scelaris perspicillata)
• Lilfords wall lizard (Podarcis lilfordi ssp addaiae)
• Turkish gecko (Hemidactylus turcicus, incl ssp spinalis)
• Moorish gecko (Tarentola mauritanica)
• Viperine snake (Natrix maura)
• Ladder snake (Rhinechis scalaris)
• Algerian false smooth snake (Macroprotodon cucullatus)

I have been to Menorca on half a dozen occasions and have so far seen: the Stripless tree frog; Hermanns tortoise; Italian wall lizard; Turkish gecko; Moorish gecko; European pond terrapin; and a couple of unidentified snakes. All these are quite common and should be seen on any visit.

Italian Wall Lizard at Cala Alcafar

The commonest is the Italian Wall Lizard, the common lizard you see all over the island.  As the name suggests they are often found on walls,  sunning themselves. I have found the best time to get close to them is just as they are comming out in the morning to warm thenselves up. At this time of day they are a but more sluggish and you can get quite close.

Stripeless Tree Frog

The Stripless Tree Frog which is found in Menorca is  Hyla meridionalis whilst the Common Tree Frog found in much of Europe is Hyla arborea.  Hyla arborea is a frog that has a prominent lateral stripe running from its snout through its eye to its rear end. The Stripeless Tree Frog has a short strip running from the eye to the front legs. However in Menorca whilst some specimens do not have a lateral stripe as the name suggests, some, as in the picture above, have a prominent stripe. If you are in Menorca  you are looking at  Hyla meridionalis - the Stripeless Tree Frog. This frog was found by the road to Cala Tirant, at the so called tirant wetlands. On this occasion they were wet, but on most visits have been dry. By moving some rocks we also saw a couple of snakes but we did not get a good enough look to tell what species they were.

  

Dragonfly ID Part 1 - Male Darters and Skimmers

Male Black-tailled Skimmer

Menorca has 2 Darters, 2 Skimmers and the Broad Scarlet, all of which are quite distinctive when one is looking at mature males. However many of the individuals that you will come across will be immatures and females and in the field these can be quite confusing.

Lets get the males out the way first

If the dragonfly is blue it is a male and is either a Black-tailed skimmer, pictured above, or a Keeled Skimmer, pictured below. The Black-tailed Skimmer has a black tail and the Keeled Skimmer does not. The Black-tailled Skimmer also has black pterostigma whilst the Keeled Skimmer has large yellow pterostigma.

Male Keeled Skimmer at Es grau

A red dragonfly is either a Broad Scarlet, a Red-veined Darter or a Common Darter.If it is bright red with a red face and no black on legs it is a Broad Scarlet. The jizz of a Broad Scarlet is different from that of the other darters and after seeing a few it is easy to pick them out. It has a very broad flat looking abdomen and the scarlet is very intense; you don't usually have to look that closely to tell them apart. Both are in the picture shown below.

Red-veined darter and Broad Scarlet

The two male Sympetrum's are harder to tell apart but the Red-veined Darter is redder than the Common Darter; the underside of its eyes are blue whilst the Common Darters are greeny; the Red-veined Darter has red veins and a more pronounced yellow patch at the base of the hindwind and the Common darter doesn't have red veins and a very small yellow hindwind patch.

Male Common Darter

Male Red-veined Darter at Es grau

   

Red-Veined Darter

Red-Veined Darters are one of my favorite dragonflies. Once you have your eye in they are easy to tell from the other darters you get on Menorca. The give away is that the lower half of the eye is blue, this can be seen from the image above.  Also in this picture you can see the orange-red veins that give this species its common name. This photo of a female was taken at the start of the Algender Gorge. 

By comparison this is a male. This photo was taken at Es Grau and shows the abdomen of the male is much thinner than that of the female and is quite red in colour. The pterostigma can be seen in the  photos of the male and female and are distinctive.

After mating these dragonflies stay in tandem to oviposit and I have seen then egg laying at quite a few locations where there is some still water. On one occasion I sew a pair in tandem over the sea and egg-laying into the Med.

The Red-Veined Darter is found in all of Southern Europe and North Africa and some of Asia and can be found in all months of the year. It is one of the few european dragonflies were their is more than one generation a year and a generation can be in a little as 3 months. In Menorca it is one of the dragonflies you see earliest in the year. It is also migratory and so in good years it is apt to spread northward in Europe and is even found as far north as England

The scientific name of the Red-Veined Darter is Sympetrum fonscolombii, but you sometimes see the name misspelt as fonscolombei.   It is likely that in the future the  Red-Veined Darter will be moved from the genus Sympetrum and placed into a new genus. This is because the behaviour of the Red-Veined Darter is different from the other Sympetrum darters, its life cycle is different and most inportantly because of genetic differences.


  

Butterflies

Speckled wood

The list of butterflies seen on Menorca runs to 27 species but a few are historic records where the butterflies only exist in museum colections as mounted specimens and so are unlikely ever to be seen in the wild again. Those that you can see in the wild today is 23 species.

Whites

Clouded Yellow

• Colias crocea, Clouded yellow. Can be common
• Gonepteryx cleopatra, Cleopatra. Common
• Gonepteryx rhamni, Brimstone. Very rare
• Leptidea sinapis, Wood white. Uncommon woodland species.
• Pieris brassicae, Large white.
• Pieris rapae, Small white.
• Pieris napi, Green-veined white.
• Pontia daplidice, Bath white.

Browns

• Coenonympha pamphilus, Small heath.
• Maniola jurtina, Meadow brown. Abundant
• Pararge aegeria, Speckled wood. Abundant. The Speckled wood found on Menorca is the aegeria sub-species which has an orange background colour.
• Lasiommata megera, Wall. Subspecies paramegera occurs as well as the nominate form.
• Lasiommata maera, Large Wall. Very rare maybe extinct
• Hipparchia semele, Grayling. Very rare maybe extinct
• Hipparchia statilinus, Tree grayling. Very rare maybe extinct
• Pyronia cecilia, Southern gatekeeper. Common

Monachs

• Danaus chrysippus, Plain Tiger.

The plain tiger is a migrant that is sometimes seen on Menorca.


Blues.

• Polyommatus icarus, Common blue. Abundant, seen all over the island.
• Polyommatus bellargus, Adonis blue. Uncommon.
• Aricia cramera, Southern brown argus. Fairly common, may be confused with female common blue.
• Celastrina argiolus, Holly blue. Common
• Lampides boeticus, Long-tailed blue. Local
• Leptotes pirithous, Lang's short-tailed blue. Local
• Lycaena phlaeas, Small copper. Local.

Geranium Bronze sitting on a geranium leaf, Cala Alcaufa, Menorca

• Callophrys rubi, Green hairstreak. Flies very early; February to April.
• Cacyreus marshalli, Geranium bronze. Can be seen all year round.

The Geranium bronze is not a native to Minorca. In 1990 was introduced, accidentally, to Majorca on imported Pelargonium from South Africa. The butterflies quickly spread to Minorca and other islands as well as to southern Spain and Italy. They are often seen in gardens on geranium plants.

Photes of many of Menorcas butterflies and other wildlife can be found on the Flikr group   of Menorcan Wildlife

 

Dragonflies

Red-veined Darter at Es grau

Nineteen species of Odonata have been recorded on Menorca, 8 damselflies and 11 dragonflies. Of these you could expect to see 15 or so on a visit.

The Emperors
 Anax imperator, Emperor dragonfly
 Anax parthenope, Lesser emperor

The Aeshnas
 Aeshna mixta, Migrant hawker
 Aeshna affinis, Blue-eyed hawker
Aeshna isoceles Green-eyed hawker

 Crocothemis erythraea, Scarlet dragonfly or Broard scarlet

 Orthetrum cancellatum, Black-tailed skimmer
 Orthetrum coerulescens, Keeled skimmer

 Sympetrum striolatum, Common darter
 Sympetrum fonscolombii, Red-veined darter

 Libellula depressa, Broad-bodied chaser

Keeled Skimmer

 

Wild Menorca

Lang's Short-tailled Blue

I have been visiting Menorca once or twice a year for quite a few years mainly in May and September. In this time I have aquired some knowledge about the wildlife of Menorca.This blog is my attempt to write about about some of the wildlife that you can find on the Island.

Italian Wall Lizard

For those that are not familier with the Island of Menorca, it is a small island in the Meniterranean sea to the west of Majorca. It is part of Spain and has a population of  88,000.

It will trake a few posting before there is a body of knowledge on the blog but I hope to cover the various groups of animals and plants that you might see on a visit and links to other sites that might be of interest.

Pyrimidal Orchid

I run a flikr group showing photos of Menorcan Wildlife