Since then it has snowed almost continuously, and frequently down to valley level, with cloud and rain (even thunder storms recently) in between. There have been hardly any sunny days at all. But it was sunny today and things STILL seemed to be emerging well ahead of schedule. I saw my earliest ever de Prunner's ringlet - a whole month earlier than last year - and my second earliest chequered blues - just a day later than last year, which was my record for that species. I got just awful, long distance shots of both, for proof of identity. Here is the first of two chequered blues I saw:
![Image](http://www.guypadfield.com/images2008/orion082.jpg)
And this is the de Prunner's ringlet, hugely cropped and resized upwards - the white pupils have become lines because of handshake or wing movement:
![Image](http://www.guypadfield.com/images2008/triaria082.jpg)
By contrast, all the hibernators seemed to have died off - I saw just three small tortoiseshells (as compared to 45 one day in February) and one large tortoiseshell. Butterflies in general were not numerous and things that had begun emerging last weekend seemed to have made little progress since.
In short, things seem to be emerging early on isolated warm days and dying off in the intervening cold weeks. I hope very much the weather pattern changes.
Guy