Boloria frigga

[Kondla, Norbert FOR:EX]

Barnes, W. and F.H. Benjamin. 1923. A new race of Brenthis from Colorado
(Lepid.). The Canadian Entomologist 55:146.
Quote: "Typical frigga presumably does not occur in North America. The broad
band of pale spots on the underside of the secondaries immediately separates
frigga from saga and allied North American forms, which probably represent a
distinct species. However as the authors possess only seven specimens of
typical frigga, they prefer to describe the following new subspecies as a
geographical race of frigga. Should the North American forms ultimately
prove to represent a distinct species, the name frigga can be dropped and
saga substituted."
So this tells me that I am not the only person who has wondered why we
should call our North American butterflies by the name of that butterfly
from another continent. Can anyone provide any citations that explain why
North American butterflies that presently wear the name frigga deserve to
wear that name ??  If anyone has even short series of spread nominate frigga
and a digital camera, please drop me a line. I would love to see what these
beasties look like in series; single illustrations in books can be
misleading in cases where the author selected atypical material to
illustrate. PS. I cannot resist to play with the words in the quote above
and say: Should the European and Asian forms ultimately prove to represent
the same species [as North American], the name saga can be relegated to a
subspecies of frigga :-) Anyone out there who does not get the point :-)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Norbert Kondla  P.Biol., RPBio.
Ministry of Sustainable Resource Management
845 Columbia Avenue, Castlegar, British Columbia V1N 1H3
Phone 250-365-8610
Mailto:Norbert.Kondla at gems3.gov.bc.ca       
http://www.env.gov.bc.ca


 
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