Butterflies of Oman

Torben Larsen is very pleased that this little book is still in demand after 30 years, a situation neither the author nor the Office of the Adviser for Conservation of the Environment to the Government of Oman could have envisaged at the time. The privilege of being among the first to research in depth the butterfly fauna of Oman and the visits to most corners of that wonderful country are among the most memorable of his life. The increasing degree of habitat destruction and the threat of global warming only serve to re-emphasize the words of His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said, which provided the mandate for this research and publication of the book: "God's gift of nature as a heritage carries with it a responsibility to guard it and nurture it for the future generations of our people."

A much more detailed review of the butterflies of the entire Arabian Peninsula was published in 1983 (LARSEN, T.B. l983. Insects of Saudi Arabia; Lepidoptera, Rhopalocera (a monograph of the butterflies of Arabia). Fauna of Saudi Arabia, 5:333-478) as a follow-up to this research, along with a companion volume intended for a more general audience (LARSEN, T.B. l984. Butterflies of Saudi Arabia and its Neighbours. Stacey International, 160 pp.). New data have been obtained in the intervening years, not least through the work of members of the Emirates Natural History Group, and inevitably there have been certain revisions to the taxonomic nomenclature, but Butterflies of Oman remains a convenient and authoritative first reference for those seeking to better acquaint themselves with the butterfly fauna of Oman and the UAE.

We are pleased to make this book available in two versions as Adobe Acrobat files.  The first is a facsimile version which is an exact scan of the original book (Butterflies of Oman Facsimile, 18.1 MB).  The second is a searchable version that has been reset with the original illustrations as close to the original as possible (Butterflies of Oman Searchable, 19.5 MB).  Both versions are bookmarked for ease of use.  Please download the ebooks to your own computer by right clicking on the link.  For Internet Explorer, choose "Save Target As ...".  For Firefox, choose "Save Link As ...".  For Chrome, choose "Save link as ...".

Thanks to Torben Larsen for agreeing to make this valuable resource available in a new format.