Goldie,from all that I've heard recently about the national scarcity of Small Coppers I think tracking down one of your very own is a far greater achievement than seeing them at Dungeness where it's hard not to step on one! It's a shame that you couldn't visit though because I'm sure you'd have loved it here, but a concussed husband takes priority!
I have in the past attempted to record my Blue Badgers, Wurzel, however, I'm a bear of very little brain and I soon ran into trouble with categorisation : no trouble with a Copper in possession of a full set of blue badges, but then I'd find one with just a slight smudge of blue, or the vaguest suggestion of blue badges, and I'd not know whether to include them or not!
I can say that it's the most common form of aberration amongst the Small Coppers here and that it's in the later broods that it appears most often.
Today for example, when the weather for Coppering was far from ideal, I came across a fully paid up member of the Small Copper Blue Badge Club
Then another with less distinct badges
And another with just slight blue badges
All I can say is that if you visit the second brood onwards at Dungeness you'll all but be certain to find one.
I find the darker models interesting ( I call them "Sooty Coppers" )
Compare a typical individual
with a Sooty
It looks as if the bright copper colour in these butterflies has been over-laid with dark scales.
My Copper-O-Meter scored 85 today
Just 10 were older Coppers
The rest were from the fresh third brood
I indulged in my favourite past-time of watching the males do combat
Great fun!
I bumped into Allan and his family in the moat on a Copper Hunt of their own - Good to see you as always Allan
Another great morning of Coppering