Yes. A warm welcome Martin.

Go on Michael get the picture out to show that his majesty likes commoners as well.

Not wanting to cast any doubt, and well done Pete for contacting Martin, but the only sites that have really been mentioned in these threads and were of particular interest to me are those in Notts and Lincs which are according to Martin "secret".

Wow. Nice

Hope you've got that little lot insured.

Have fun.

Hi Seth I'll be happy to buy you a pint. I'm doing the same as you. My other half (better some say) is working at my local tonight so maybe I should do the right thing and go keep her company. Other side of the bar of course. So I'll retire from these extremely interesting debates for the evening an...

Hi Neil Some interesting information there. This just backs up my argument in that the genetic mingling you refer to would have been perfectly natural and wholly acceptable. The Swallowtail was just an example of a possibility that was brought up by Jack. My worry is where the gene pool of a very sm...

I think personally that natural immigration is fine. If it is going to happen, then that's the natural way of things, such as the example of Swallowtails. It may even be that an influx of the european vagrants is necessary to ensure the diversity of the genetic make up of the British Swallowtails. M...

I'm going to harp on about the effect of introductions on the genetics of a population. If foreign genes are introduced into a population of British butterflies you are potentially preventing the occurrence of speciation. There is a good chance that British races could develop into completely new sp...

Too many unknowns for me to form an opinion at the moment but I'll be watching this thread with great interest. Thanks for starting it off Jack.

Too right Susie.

Some butterfly houses have hot air blowers to remove the condensation from cold glass lenses to speed up the process.

It's OK assuming that small scale introductions do no harm and they probably don't when they do not come into contact with any other populations but what if foreign races are allowed to breed with a race that is endemic to the British Isles. It is quite possible and alarming to me that the British r...

I think you're correct as I seem to remember my Manfrotto 501HDV Video Head came with an adapter ring also.

Sorry, no snowy Chrimbo related photo as I'm currently at work but just wanted to wish everyone a great Christmas and thanks for making my first year on UKButterflies a highly interesting one.

Merry Christmas one and all.

Looks like you have the adapter thingy that allows use of the head with both screw sizes. This probably comes as standard with the Manfrotto heads. It may be I was thinking the other way round that you can't put a Velbon head on a Manfrotto leg set unless you have more adapter thingies. My mistake. ...

If you're thinking of a Manfrotto head it won't go on the Velbon tripod without an adapter of some sort as Manfrotto use something like a 3/4" screw whereas Velbon use only a 1/4" fitting. You possibly knew this and had in mind a whole new set up.

Putting something back that was once there to me seems favourable, whether it be the actual beastie or something very close i.e. Large Blue. These actions should be considered and authorised by whoever needs to authorise (another debate or not). Placing something in a place where it never was to me ...

More like the two hairy bikers

This has all been a fantastic discussion with a well thought out summary Pete. I think expert breeders should have a part to play using their expertise to aid in re-introductions of native species / sub species with the backing of maybe BC or other bodies such as UKB who would give serious thought a...

Seth Plus I've gotta try the Purple Emperor luring trick for myself next season. Get yourself a nicely soaked fox turd it works much better. Horse manure is pretty good also. One chap got a Black Emperor (lacking any white) sat on horse muck at Fermyn Woods last year. I missed it by 20 minutes. I wa...

Bozo or not was he the gentleman who introduced Silver-studded Blue, Dark Green Fritillary and from what I have heard the scottish sub species of Scotch Argus into North Notts close to where he lives judging by the footage on last nights program. I make no judgement. Overall I thought the program ha...