April 2023

[Jack Harrison]

7th April. My wife Stella Donnelly beat me to it this year with two butterflies beside the river in Inverness.

One Comma and one unidentified white (likely to have been a Green-veined).

I have yet to see any butterflies this spring.

Jack

[David M]

...I have yet to see any butterflies this spring.

How often have you gone until 7th April without seeing a butterfly, Jack?

[David M]

Friday 7th, Dan-y-Graig cemetery, Swansea:

Brimstone 5
Small White 1
Small Tortoiseshell 1

[millerd]

Another first for the year on my local patch near Heathrow today: two Speckled Woods. Overall, seven species were seen, making today the best of the year so far. The tally looked like this:

Peacock 9
Brimstone 7 (including one female)
Comma 5
Small Tortoiseshell 2
Speckled Wood 2
Small White 1
Red Admiral 1

Some highlights:

As I reached home I spotted several raptors wheeling overhead. Red Kites are an everyday occurrence these days, but though this photo is not the clearest, I think that as well as a Kite (top left), at least one of the other two is a Buzzard. It seemed unusual to see them in such close proximity.

Dave

[bugboy]

Another first for the year on my local patch near Heathrow today: two Speckled Woods. Overall, seven species were seen, making today the best of the year so far. The tally looked like this:

Peacock 9
Brimstone 7 (including one female)
Comma 5
Small Tortoiseshell 2
Speckled Wood 2
Small White 1
Red Admiral 1


As I reached home I spotted several raptors wheeling overhead. Red Kites are an everyday occurrence these days, but though this photo is not the clearest, I think that as well as a Kite (top left), at least one of the other two is a Buzzard. It seemed unusual to see them in such close proximity.birds 070423.JPG

Dave

Good to see things livening up on your patch now. I would concur with your raptor ID's, the top two are Kites with the lower bird being a Buzzard.

[Charles Nicol]

walked for several miles round Little Paxton Nature Reserve today. plenty of sunshine.

Peacocks and male Brimstones aplenty. one Small White

[Testudo Man]

...its nice to "brush off" that miserable month of March, an look forward to some more Spring sunshine...

Sure is, Paul. Been a long time coming but better late than never.

Cheers David, yes, i think we all deserve a good Spring now.

Yesterday, i visited a brand new location to me here in Kent, an spent a good 5 hours on site(even caught a little sun on my face!).
Really good numbers sighted, but would have to say that the Commas were the "butterflies of the day".
Numbers seen were - Comma 15+, Peacock 15+, Brimstone 10+, 1 Small Tort, 2 Small White, an 1 possible GVW?...9 Common Lizards seen too.

Some highlight pics, no images are cropped. Cheers Paul.
A really good session, probably one of the best experiences ive had with the (sometimes overlooked) common Comma.

When the sun went behind the clouds, the Commas would either fly up to the tree tops, or drop down low, an sometimes close their wings an virtually vanish from sight! In this last pic, 3 Commas are perched low, waiting for the sun to come back out.

[David M]

That sure was a Comma 'clean-up', Paul.

Talk about having them eating out of your hand!

Hard enough to get two of them in the same frame, let alone three.

[David M]

Friday 7th, Cwm Ivy, Gower:

Brimstone 19
Comma 8
Speckled Wood 4
Peacock 3
Holly Blue 3
Red Admiral 2

[millerd]

A similar walk at a similar time to yesterday's, but with slightly different results.

Peacock 5
Comma 3
Small White 3 (2m; 1f)
Brimstone 1 (m)
Holly Blue 1 (m)

Annoyingly the Holly Blue played hard to get, but the female Small White was quite sluggish while the sun was in and likely to have been newly emerged.

This was as close as I could get to a male however.

The Brimstone was found looking avidly for somewhere to roost (this was about 1530 - they do go to bed early), and this was where it chose.

Finally a typically photogenic Comma.

Dave

[Allan.W.]

Bits and Pieces .
Things are still fairly slow here in my part of Kent ,although yesterday was much better than of late ,so i thought a trip up to my local wood may be a good idea . I did a much extended walk (in Orlestone ) taking in the area where the Large Tort; was reported a few days back ,i found plenty on the wing(not Large Torts !) with around ten each of Comma ,Brimstone and Peacock ,and pleased to see my first two Red Admirals of the year .I,ve also been looking for some likely new areas in the forest for Grizzled Skips and Purple Emps .
taken very few Butterfly shots at present ,anyway heres a couple.

While i,m wandering about in the woods i keep an eye out for the Birds ,and although i,ve only got a standard lense ,i like to have a go at getting a few pics ,saw several "singing" Chiffchaffs including 1 with a silver leg ring ,.i also spotted a Treecreeper sporting a Silver ring . Heres a Chiff that came close enough for a mug shot.

A morning trip to Dungeness to try for Penduline Tit and Alpine Swift ,didn,t go too well ...............no joy for either ,did have some excellent flight views of the "resident " Glossy Ibis pair and some early flowering shingle plants .
The one below is the beautiful diminutive Early Forget-me-not.

On the gatepost of the observatory were a large group of Firebugs.

Today ,i thought i,d have a trip to the local Hothfield Common to see if the Great Grey Shrike was still about ,i wasn,t too confident as it hasn,t been seen for a few days ..................but nothing ventured !
When i arrived i noticed another Birder at distance ,and he didn,t seem to be having much luck .I tried the area where i,d seen it (or another !) back at the beginning of November ,and sat and scanned around ,also giving my Emperor Moth lure a try ,but after about twenty minutes i moved on ,as i rounded the main bog ..............there it was ,low down ,giving great views ,reckon i watched it for over an hour ,it was also in hunting mode and i watched it pounce (?) on something small and furry ! but couldn,t see whether it hung it up or not.

Allan.W.

[David M]

Saturday 8th, Cwm Ivy, Gower:

Brimstone 36
Holly Blue 22
Comma 7
Speckled Wood 4
Peacock 3
Red Admiral 3
Small Tortoiseshell 2

[SarahM]

Saturday 8th - Cliburn Moss NNR

A beautiful warm sunny day at last, so decided to go to Cliburn Moss to look for Green Hairstreak. There wasn't much Bilberry about but I managed to find 10 GH around young Pines. They were very active but I managed to find one posing long enough for a quick photo. I missed the first seen in the county by a day.
Also saw 4 Peacocks.

Sarah.

[David M]

That's a surprisingly early sighting of GH given the poor weather until quite recently, Sarah.

Even in a warm spring, I won't see this species round my way till the second half of April.

[SarahM]

Hi David,

I agree, it is early but I was desperate to go and look. My first sighting of GH last year (also at Cliburn Moss) was 16th April which was the first GH sighting of the year for Cumbria. It's not as if the weather has been good here, far from it. We were back to a cold & windy day yesterday even though full sun was forecast!

Sarah.

[Neil Freeman]

First reports of Green Hairstreaks from Cannock Chase and other Staffordshire moorland sites over the weekend. These Bilberry feeding populations are always the first out in the midlands, usually a couple of weeks before other populations here.


Cheers,

Neil

[Testudo Man]

That sure was a Comma 'clean-up', Paul.

Talk about having them eating out of your hand!

Hard enough to get two of them in the same frame, let alone three.

Thanks David, yes, to get 3 in the same shot was nice.

So, yesterday, i returned to the same location, an it was much of the same with species an numbers being similar. Maybe a few more Small Whites an GVW's...But in addition, a lovely Orange Tip was on the wing (Thats the 8th species this year so far for me here in Kent) but still no sign of Holly Blue or Speckled Wood!! The Temps were warmer, but the winds a little stronger than 2 days previous. A good 4+ hour session.
Some highlight pics, no images are cropped, cheers Paul.
PS. A male Orange Tip flew through my garden in the morning yesterday, so i was expecting to see a few more Orange Tips on location, but i reckon just the 1 was on the wing?

I would normally have deleted this last close up Orange Tip image (because the butterfly is way out of focus!) but a Hoverfly "photobombed" the scene so i think the cameras Autofocus locked onto the Hoverfly, rather than my intended target!

One of the many Commas, still basking beyond 4.00pm.

[millerd]

After a very damp morning, the afternoon kicked off on my local patch today with a torrential downpour. Not promising... However, by half two the sun had appeared, along with a stiff breeze, but now the butterflies are awake it only takes a bit of bright sunshine to tempt them into the air. Commas, Peacocks, a Speckled Wood and a Red Admiral responded to the call at any rate.

Nothing special you might think, but having recently been seeing just increasingly worn Red Admirals, this one was different. A notable bialbata variant, I realised that this also looked like a brand new butterfly. As all my observations of this species' caterpillars gradually came to halt in the frosts of January, I had pretty well given up hope that any had made it through. However, a new adult at this time of year is almost certainly the result of such a success (I suppose an early migrant cannot 100% be ruled out - though to be honest that would take a bit of doing too!).

Dave

[millerd]

...I suppose an early migrant cannot 100% be ruled out - though to be honest that would take a bit of doing too...

Dave

I take it all back!

I had an earlyish walk locally today before the cloud built (hopeful for some emerging Holly Blues). I found a Specklie in one of their usual sheltered spots, but had pretty well given up on seeing anything else. However, I was stirred into action by a bright pinky-orange blur of colour swooping around a bit of dandelion-studded grass. With all the reported LT sightings, there was a momentary flush of excitement, but this was replaced almost immediately by a lesser flush as the butterfly passed close by: it was a Painted Lady.

Having pooh-poohed the idea of migrant Red Admirals only yesterday, a migrant of a closely-allied species appears within 24 hours. What can you say?

Dave

[David M]

Nice sighting, Dave! It might regret flying here if tomorrow's forecast proves accurate.