Red Admiral

Vanessa atalanta is one of the most familiar butterflies of European, North American, and Asian gardens — instantly recognizable for the dramatic dark velvet-black forewings crossed by a vivid red-orange band, with white spots near the wing tips. The species is widely cosmopolitan across the Northern Hemisphere temperate and subtropical zones. Like the closely related painted lady (V. cardui), red admirals are long-distance migrants: northern populations cannot survive most winters and the species annually rotates north from overwintering grounds in the Mediterranean and North Africa to as far as Scandinavia and Iceland in spring, with a southward return in autumn — a multi-generational pattern (typically 2-4 generations per annual cycle, smaller than the painted lady's 6 generations). Males are notoriously territorial. They establish small lekking territories at sunny vertical features (tree trunks, garden walls, building corners, narrow paths through woodland) in late afternoon, perch in conspicuous positions, and aerially intercept anything that moves through the airspace — other butterflies, dragonflies, hoverflies, small birds, and humans (the male will buzz a person's hat for several seconds before retreating). The territoriality serves to position the male for encounters with passing receptive females. Caterpillars feed on stinging nettle (Urtica dioica) and a few related Urticaceae; the larvae build small leaf-shelters by rolling and tying nettle leaves with silk.