Wurzel

[ernie f]

Wurzel

I love the shot of the Small Tort from underneath with the muscorum centre stage. Brilliant!

[Andrew555]

Look at you Wurzel, swimming in Torts and I still haven't seen one!

[Goldie M]

Lovely Tort's Wurzel, your seeing loads of Tort's and I was up to my eye's in OT's today. Goldie

[Wurzel]

Cheers Ernie I like to try for the 'stained glass' shot and Muscorum offers an ideal perch, though they're getting harder to get now as my hips are starting to wear
Cheers Andrew Have they not got to you yet? Lazy little blighters! Just a heads up my next post will have my largest number of Small Torts so you might want to skip it...
Cheers Goldie That's the thing with this season; one minute there's loads of butterflies the next there's none, then there's loads again - you've just got to pick your day (or in my case hope that the weekend is decent weather wise )

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Wurzel]

May 2018

Now things will hopefully get proper started!

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[essexbuzzard]

Yay! Spring is not allowed to be held up any longer.

[millerd]

From the end of the week, things look decidedly good. How long before the subject of your calendar photo will be out on the Hill do you think, Wurzel?

Dave

[Wurzel]

Cheers Essex I totally agree hopefully the pay back for all this terrible butterfly weather will be a fantastic late spring and summer!
Cheers Dave I reckon about a fortnight for them to really get going - I saw my first at Larkhill on 10th May last year but things have slowed this year...I'll keep checking the Wiltshire website but we haven't had reports of Grizzlies yet

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Goldie M]

Hi! Wurzel. next week looks good, hope fully I'll try my luck in Wales and at GB then. Goldie

[Wurzel]

Cheers Goldie Definitely worth a look even if the weather is half as good as they reckon, fingers crossed it comes off for you!

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Wurzel]

Work 19-04-2018

After the improvement in the weather continued I stepped out at lunch again today and again I went slightly off piste as it were as I again went to check out the old jump pits. Unlike yesterday however it only threw up the one butterfly – a Small Tort. I carried onto the hedge and made to walk through the small line of trees which separated the pits from the pitches. When a Peacock flew through the same gap I followed it as it wove along the boundary hedge only to disappear over the top and to the fields beyond. As I found myself on the opposite side of the field from what I was sued to I carried on anyway. After a while, almost three quarters along the length of the hedge I was regretting not taking this walk before as I was racking up the Small Torts, the tally was going over double figures. I’d also had a Comma drop in for a bit, it rummaged around in the bushes and then shot off after a Small tort.

I carried on following the field around to the left finding another Small Tort, then another (number 12) and then a Peacock. It took off, hassled by a Small Tort (number 13) which harassed it for a bit before both landed on a concrete fence post and the Small Tort made what seemed to be courtship advances? I left them to it as I was limited for time. How come I can’t find these things when I’ve got hours to kill and so I’m able to wait and watch? Finding Small Tort number 14 about 2 metres away from the back path I set off on my usual route and so reset the mental counter to zero as it was going to be business as usual along the narrow and familiar track.

After the plethora of butterflies from before it came as a bit of a shock when I realised that I was fast approaching the half way mark and I’d not seen anymore. However I needn’t have worried as a Peacock saw of a Small Tort before taking up position on top of a fence post. After this it was indeed back to business as usual and I added another 5 Small Torts and another Peacock to the lunch time tally.

All told there was a Comma, 4 Peacocks and 20 Small Torts. What a cracking half hour!

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Andrew555]

Skip a Wurzel post ?! Never! No matter how many Torts..
Great stuff.

[Wurzel]

Cheers Andrew You're safe now - the Small Torts have quietened down I think that was their peak

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[millerd]

Pretty good for half an hour, Wurzel. Peacocks and Torties do seem to suffer identity problems - I've seen such "courtship" several times, usually male Tortoiseshells pestering female Peacocks.

Dave

[Neil Freeman]

I like that Peacock on top of the fence post

I notice a number of species seem to get a bit 'confused'...I have seen Small Torts try it on with Peacocks, Orange-tips with GV and Small Whites...and the whites with female Orange-tips. It seems that anything with a similar colour scheme will often trigger the behaviour.

Cheers,

Neil.

[bugboy]

20 Small Torts, that IS a cracking lunchtime ramble, I'm lucky to get half that in a day in most of my haunts!

[Wurzel]

Cheers Dave So it was in this case but unfortunately I couldn't hang around to see if his advances came to fruition, that's the one drawback to the change of timings of the day On the other hand we do finish a lot earlier...more of that in the next post Once I've written it
Cheers Neil I liked that one too - it was acting like the Black Knight - "None shall pass!"
Cheers Bugboy I think that was the peak Bugboy but it was still great to see, I'll have to do a few 'lunchtimes' later in the year to see how successful they were

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Goldie M]

Hi! Wurzel, I saw one ST today at Southport but it didn't stop, infact nothing did for very long It's still great just to out in the Sun though isn't Goldie

[Wurzel]

It is great isn't Goldie I was enjoying the sun and my first Greenstreak of the year today but I got called away by my daughters as they were worried about a stranded sheep and they wanted me to sort it out It's a long story for a post at a later date...but then aren't all of my posts

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Wurzel]

Vera Jone’s Mill 19-04-2018

After my success with the Nymphalids at lunch I started wondering where the Whites were? I reasoned that perhaps the habitat offered by the back path wasn’t the best and so I hatched a plan. As I had a parents evening I would be experiencing the joys of ‘trapped time’. This is where there isn’t enough time to travel home and back and so usually I catch up on work or play cards with the Maths Department et al. However this time I decided I’d nip out to Vera Jones’s Mill to hopefully connect with some Whites.

It was mighty W when I arrived and as I walked through the gate a Small Tort buzzed me in greeting. Slightly further along another Small Tort took off from an invisible resting place among the grass. Over another gate, down the hill and through the next gate and I was in the noticeably cooler dappled shade of the small wood which encroaches on the fen. Taking to the boardwalk I scanned around hoping for a Specklie though none appeared. Instead at the end of the boardwalk I surprised two male Orange-tips who broke apart from their sparring and shot away at height.
Annoyed that my first sighting had been so brief I carried on across the raised path which bisects the fen noting a Peacock further out where I’d have sunk up to me knees in bog. I walked up and down glimpsing an Orange-tip on either side of the path (the two originals?) both of which kept disappearing from view as they flew low along the ditches. Another White butterfly appeared as if from nowhere and it didn’t have the cream tangerine appearance of a distant OT, instead it seemed more lemony so I watched it fly into the opposite field, followed it and managed to predict roughly where it would land. When it dropped and started to take nectar I was there ready to get some shots of my first Small White. Chuffed I made my way back to the fen, stopping briefly for a Small Tort before once again enjoying the clomping sound of my feet on the wooden pathway.

I took the path to the right which cut across the fen and dove down into the more wooded area. There to greet me was another Orange-tip bombing along at breakneck speed. I got annoyed with myself as after weeks of bemoaning the dull, cool and wet weather now I found myself moaning that it was too hot! Another OT flew by past me half way through the wood and then as the path takes a left turn I saw my fifth. None stopped, all persistently patrolled and the only shots I could manage were grabbed, blurry distant in flight shots. Maybe a trip next week if it’s 5 or so degrees cooler will see me actually latch onto some OT’s?

At this turn in the path straight ahead is another field demarcated by a wire fence. Clinging to this was a Comma. As I cautiously approached a Peacock flew by and the Comma was off like a shot to see off the intruder. I made my way round the entire circuit a second time but despite the usual early season grab shots of OT’s there was no change in the cast enacting the Act 2. It still felt hot as I strode up the hill and I started sweating for the first time this year!
Have a goodun

Wurzel