7 year old collector- question

[Pierre Zagatti]

In article <33961B60.AB2 at epix.net>, Margaret Wood <mwood at epix.net> says:
>
>We are traveling from the US to Ireland, UK and France, camping, for the
>summer. My 7 year old son collects butterflies.Anyone know what we are
>allowed to do with regard to customs and moving between these countries
>with his collection? He only "collects" common species, if we see
>something rare we just try to get a photo. It really helps keep him
>happy and busy, and is a great activity on the go.It would be too bad if
>his collection gets confiscated! Any suggestions anyone?
>Thanks
>Margaret

In France:
The butterflies protected by the law are uncommon and quite
impossible to find if you don't know exactly their last habitats.
This is specially true for species flying in summer.
As a general rule, avoid collecting in peat bogs (a place not
really visited by young boys) as many species may appear common
on these bogs. All protected species look like other species
that are pretty common, they may be distinguished with a
-good- field guide only.

No problem with French customs, they will call an expert entomologist
only if you carry hundreds of specimens. And collecting unprotected
insects is still legal in this country (you may have more problems
with US customs when coming back).

Note that the situation is quite different for beetles: several
species are protected that are still common in (southern) France:
Lucanus cervus, Rosalia alpina, Cerambyx cerdo (the latter being
a pest in some places) whereas some very rare and endangered species
are still unprotected.

I don't want to post here a complete list of protected species,
as I did it twice in entomological newsgroups. e-mail me if you
want this list. There is a web site with such lists for several
countries, but I don't remember the address...



Pierre Zagatti
INRA Phytopharmacie et Mediateurs Chimiques
78026 Versailles Cedex
France
zagatti at versailles.inra.fr
http://www.jouy.inra.fr/papillon/