Although quite fresh specimens are fuscous-brown, the butterfly, after a short time on the wing, loses the dusky tinge and becomes brown. It is, therefore, always desirable to rear specimens for the cabinet from caterpillars. These feed on grasses of various kinds in May, are easily managed, and may be found in most hay meadows at night, when, of course, a lantern will be needed to throw a light on the business of collecting them.
The not infrequent occurrence of fresh specimens in the autumn is strong presumptive evidence of at least an occasional second brood. Perhaps, as has been suggested by Mr. R. Adkin, "a late emergence of Epinephele ianira is the rule rather than the exception," especially in the warmer parts of the country.
The butterfly is found throughout England and Wales, Ireland, and Scotland, including Isles of Lewis and Orkney. Abroad it occurs in all parts of Europe except the most northern, Asia Minor, Armenia, North Africa, and the Canary Isles.
The Gatekeeper (Epinephele tithonus).
Other English names in use at the present time for this butterfly (Plate [87]) are "Small Meadow Brown," "Hedge Brown," and "Large Heath," but the latter is more often applied to another species which will be referred to later. Petiver called it the "Hedge Eye."
The general colour is brownish-orange, and the margins are fuscous-brown; there is a black spot towards the tips of the fore wings, and this, as a rule, encloses two white dots; one or both of these dots sometimes absent in the male. The male differs from the female in its rather smaller size, and in having a fuscous band on the central area; the latter is broadest towards the inner margin, and in this part are some patches of blackish androconial scales or plumules; at the upper end of the band there is sometimes a fuscous cloud. Occasionally, one or more small black spots, some with white pupils, are present below the apical one. Four such spots are rare, but specimens with one or with two are not uncommon. There is usually a white-pupilled black spot towards the anal angle of the hind wing, but I have several males and females that are without this spot. Sometimes there are as many as four spots on the hind wings, but this is perhaps exceptional (Plate [113,] Fig. [5]). On the under side of the hind wings there are often two white dots, sometimes ringed with black, towards the costa, and two or three other similar dots towards the anal angle; but the number of dots may be reduced to two, one of which is near the costa, or be increased to six. Colour changes, similar to those in the last species, occur, and the orange colour, in both sexes, may be replaced by yellow (var. mincki, Seebold), or by white (var. albida, Russell, Plate [119,] Figs. 6, 7). Such aberrations are very local and rare; a few have been obtained on chalk hills in South Hampshire.
In an extraordinary aberration, taken in Sussex in 1897, the whole of the dark brown colour of margins and band is replaced by pale pinkish-ochreous, but the normal brownish orange remains. Other somewhat similar specimens have been recorded.
The egg (Plate [86]) is pale yellowish when first laid, becoming lighter and irregularly blotched with reddish-brown, the upper blotches forming a sort of band round the egg; as the caterpillar matures the shell assumes a darker tinge, inclining to slaty, and the markings are less distinct.
The caterpillar, when full grown, is pale ochreous, clothed with short pale hair, and freckled with brownish; the line down the back is darker, one on each side is paler, and that above the feet is yellowish. The head is rather darker than the body, marked with brownish, and bristly.