Apamea maillardi (Geyer, 1834)

Host plants:
The caterpillar lives on tussock forming grasses, particularly common on Deschampsia caespitosa.

Habitat:
Apamea maillardi is mostly found on cliffs, rocky mountain meadows, embankments and similar sites between approximately 1500 and 2700 meters above sea level (maximum from 1800 to 2300m asl).

Life cycle:
The caterpillar overwinters according to own observations twice (once young to half-grown, the second time fully-grown). It lives in a cavity in the root collar area of the clumps, often at the foot of rocks, on the edge of cliffs or on debris corridors on slopes of mountain streams, where they also hibernate. After the second winter it leaves the cavity to pupate concealed in some distance on the ground usually without re-feeding (usually in May or June). Apamea maillardi is ideally suited to the short growing season in the mountains through this two-year life cycle, which is found in many high-alpine species in similar form.

The moths fly from June to August with peak from mid-July to early August. The closely related Apamea zeta is supposed to have a similar life cycle, whereas about Apamea lateritia and A. furva winter apparently only once even in the same altitudes.

Endangerment factors:
Apamea maillardi is threatened only little due to its high altitude and widespread habitats in the higher mountains.

Remarks:
Apamea maillardi occurs from Northern Spain (Cantabrian Mountains, Pyrenees) across France (Pyrenees, Alps) and the entire Alpine Arc. It also occurs in some higher mountains of the Balkans and the Carpathians.

In Scandinavia flies a taxon that was considered as a subspecies for a long time. Most recently it is regarded as a separate species Apamea (Abromias) schildei (whether really justified?). Here the post-glacial isolation of the disjunct populations of the southern mountains from those of Scandinavia has led to separate races, which can be regarded depending on the point of view either as subspecies of a species Apamea maillardi or as separate species.