Lepidoptera and some other life forms

This "project" has started as my desire to scan images of Finnish lepidoptera and make them available on the web. The original idea has evolved and is still evolving into different directions. From the lepidoptera I am expanding to other life forms, however the lepidoptera contains the most information. Other sections are mostly species lists.

Referencing this site
I've no objections of placing direct links to any HTML file at any level. However, this structure is constantly changing, and the deeper you link, the higher the chance that link stops working after some revision. When placing direct links to the images (which should be avoided in general), the link should be associated with copyright information of the refenced image.
Taxonomic referencing
Don't do it! Or, if you do, keep in mind that this site is a collection of names (taxa). The status or ranking of a specific taxon in this site should not be referenced. This site does not contain orignal taxonomic information or opinions. Everthing is based on published literature or other information given to me. Use the referenced original sources (when I have listed them - if not, then source may be some other, random web page). The structure is dynamic and keeps changing depending on what authority I decide to follow at that point of time.

The current structure includes (if you are looking at these pages for the first time, do not follow the links below yet, read some more explanations first to avoid getting lost into structure):

WARP

The above links lead into taxonomical tree structure, which may be hard to navigate, until you are familiar with it. The other way to navigate directly deep into the taxonomic tree structure is through the "warp page", which collects all the automaticly generated indexes into single page. The warp page enables quick access to:

Photograps
The fastest way to see what images are available is the life-English-Photolist. This is a top level list containing references to actual photo lists.
The images are copyright to photographers as indicated. They are NOT public domain. To use them outside this structure, contact the photographer in question and ask.
As it will be totally impossible for me to get all pictures myself, I will gladly accept images of life forms from anywhere in the world to be placed into the structure. If you have pictures, which are accompanied with species name, location, approximate date and photographer, and which you are willing have displayed under my structure, contact me for details. But read the "license" for a brief basics on terms of usage.

There is a page set from the thumbnails of the photographs from each person that has contributed more than few photographs to this site. The table of contents of these "album pages" contains contains the links to the thumbnail pages (in rather random order).

Common names
Separate alphabetical indexes are generated for Finnish and English common names. For English example, see names indexed under R. And for a Finnish example, see names indexed under R. These indexes include only species from which a common name is entered into the system.

Also, as with photographs, there are lists containing all common names recorded in this structure for Finnish or English. However, note that the great majority of the taxa do not have a common name listed.

The structure includes occasional common name with other languages than English or Finnish, and similar indexes could be generated from them, but is not currently done. Too few species would have entry.

Scientific names
Similar alphabetical indexes are generated from the scientific names, for example R. As with common names indexes, the links in indexes take you directly into the corresponding location in the taxonomical tree structure.

There is also a plain scientific names list of lists for all taxa (otherwise it is similar to the previously mentioned common name lists).

Checklists
The checklists are lists that include only the species recorded from Finland. These lists are not complete for every group. The most accurate one is the Lepidoptera list. Again, there is also a top level list for accessing all Finnish checklists (or partial lists)
Protected species list (not in warp page)
Changed 1997 The list of protected insect species in Finland.

Related issues

Please! The above tibiale image is the official logo of SPS, do not use it without permission on your pages!
Finnish Lepidopterologist Society (my translation from Finnish "Suomen Perhostutkijain Seura ry." to English).

Butterfly news from Finland, first sightings and migrations (maintained by Arto Avanto). Through this page you can access reported observations about lepidoptera progress in Finland during the current year.


Some of the inspirations for these pages come from the Tree of Life project by University of Arizona.

Many links to various other places can be found from "Electronic Resources on Lepidoptera".

Miscellanous links to lepidoptera related information in nearby countries that I have been able to locate:


Browsing the taxonomic tree structure

On top of each index page you will see the path from the top to the current level and the links point to the index pages of each level.

This is followed by a navigation bar, that currently contains three rows of information: Global view - All, Finnish regional view and Photo for Photograps view. Prev/Next links traverse the tree structure and the remaining three columns hold links to the respective positions in different lists (scientific names, Finnish names and English names), when applicable.


[INDEXES] Takes to a warp page, which lets you quickly access all of the automaticly generated check lists and alphabetical indexes. For example, index of all scientific and common names (Finnish and English).

[HOME] This button will always bring you back to this introduction page.

All (in navigation bar) marks the information assosiated with global view, all information from the structure included.

fi Indicates a species that has been recorded at least once within Finnish borders. These species appear in the generated Checklist of the Finnish Lepidoptera (also accessible through the warp page).

Photo (in navigation bar) marks the information associated with photograps.

caja (Linnaeus, 1758)¹
Gives the species name and author of the name.
¹There is convention that assigns semantics to whether the author name is in parentheses or not. I didn't know about this when I started building the database. Now, I have the mechanism to follow the convention in place, but much of the data is still in old unspecific format. Gradually I will correct the erroneus format, but until then all uncorrected author names are shown as above, in parenthese and a small [¹] attaced to the closing parenheses. If you don't see this little footnote marker, you can assume that that part of the database has been fixed, and report any apparent erros to me.

I have tried to fill in common names in various languages. The following flag symbols are used to mark geographical areas where a common name is being used.

Finnish: Finnish common names
English: British common names
USA: American common names
Note: the distinction between British and American is a recent addition, and thus not yet applied throughout.
German: German common names
French: French common names
Spanish: Spanish common names
Swedish: Swedish common names
Danish: Danish common names

Region: For some species I am experimentally generating a very rough range map. These maps should not be taken as any indication of how common the species is. The only purpose of the maps at this point, is to give an idea about which part of the world the species occurs. For more information, see About maps.

[caja.jpg] 669x364(~60Kb)

On species level, if an image is included, it is indicated by a this type of thumbnail image, which when selected, will display a larger image (size and dimensions as indicated) alone in a window. Both the thumbnail and actual image are in JPEG format.

When the image has been taken in the wild from live specimen, the caption under the image contains additional information, such as location, date and photographer.



Browsing the checklist and common names lists

The list is a linear list of all index pages within the tree, each link will take to the corresponding index page inside the tree.



Markku Savela