Glad we found some Wall larva for you Gary. Like the BH ova and the PBF larva. Will have to look harder for these!!

The difference a day makes. Yesterday I met up with Gary Norman to show him the Wall Brown larvae. With heavy clouds and a cool breeze we found 3 as well as a Speckled Wood larva. Today, with the sun shining I called back up and found the same 3 as well as a couple of new ones. With the sun shining ...

At least 7 Brimstone, 2 Comma and a Peacock at Abbotts Wood yesterday as well as an Orange Underwing moth.

Hi David, Pauline and Nick. I should be doing a little movie sequence with Dan Danahar soon showing the hunt for Wall larvae. Hopefully this will inspire other hunters!!
Thanks very much for your comments.

A stunning day today, out of the breeze so another larva hunt was the order of the day. I was greeted by my first confirmed Peacock making the most of the warmth of the sun. I then found 7 Wall Brown larvae of which at least 3 were new individuals. My find of the day however was my first Speckled Wo...

02/02/16 At High and Over today, once the rain had stopper and the sun came out, I checked out the Wall Brown larva. 5 seen and were all active with the largest now doubled in size since I first found the first 2 in December being now up to 2 cm. in length. Then in the distance I saw a light butterf...

Just a brief note that yesterday, even following the coldest night of the winter, and with heavy frost and frozen ground, I still found the 2 Wall Brown larva that I'm monitoring. Both were in grassy tussocks about 1 inch above ground. They were both still but certainly alive and well.

With a very cold night last night I was curious to see if the Wall Brown larva were active in the sunshine!! I was amazed how cold it was in the carpark but as soon as I hit the bank where I find the larva the temperature change was very noticeable with it being in strong sunshine and also being pro...

With all these wind and solar farms cropping up all over the place why can't wild flowers be planted between the panels or turbines and left to grow. This would help nectaring insects of all sorts find food. This would then help insect feeding birds etc. etc. Bee hives could also be placed at the ed...

I relocated 2 of the Wall Brown larva yesterday and they had both grown a bit since the 18th December. Both seemed to be healthy and resting a couple of inches above ground on a grass stem.

Hi David. Thanks for your comments. I have found early stages in January before a really cold spell and it seems they are able to go deep into the base of the tussocks to protect against the cold. In the past as soon as a milder spell comes back they are visible again pretty quickly. I've even seen ...

Thanks Trevor. Hard to believe how mild it is out there. Lets hope we still get a proper winter to kill off the nasty things out there!! The Wall larva I found were certainly a little larger than those I found on January 6th. If they survive and the winter keeps mild it is anyones guess as to when t...

It is so mild out there, and all this mention of bad news lately for the Wall Brown. To stop myself getting too depressed about it all I thought I would head up to my area of Downland to see if I could find any Wall Brown larva!! I have never seen them in December before, although I probably haven't...

A wonderful and worthy winner. Well done Iain on a fabulous image.

At last I thought I would post some of my Long-tailed Blue images. I have been doing most of my hunting with James (B. Rex) and Mark Colvin and a few hunts with Neil. As most of the sightings were further West this year than our local site of Tide Mills my total for the year was a minimum of 10. Man...

Great to meet you yesterday Paul. I was really hoping we could hunt a blue out between us to reward you for all your visits. Hope you still manage to get lucky.

Good to see you today Katrina. Great to see some more of these beauties.

Amazingly beautiful Neil. Simply fantastic and what a find!! With temperatures being cooler than what this butterfly is used to during its stages perhaps more aberrants will appear!!

My final species of mainland butterflies pulled me up to Scotland this year, after 3 years planned that fell through. My thanks to Downland Boy for helping to make the week extremely successful and enjoyable. The Skipper was all that I had hoped for as well. Brilliant!! DSC_6972 (1280x854).jpg DSC_6...

A terrific day James and thanks for grabbing hold of the steering wheel and making the car do a big U turn!! It was worth the effort. Glad you got some good results as well.