The weather forecast for the area looked good as we set off from Stansted on the afternoon of 7th August, but I had been receiving reports of very poor butterfly numbers at high altitude in the French Alps this year and had no idea what to expect from the Hautes Pyrenees in this most bizarre of seasons.
We arrived in Biarritz late pm and had to endure some shockingly poor customer service at the hire car pick-up, before finally getting on the road an hour later, arriving at what would be our home base for three nights in Luz Saint Sauveur just as the sun was beginning to fall behind the mountains. Time for an early night after a tiring day of travel, but with anticipation mounting for what we might find the following day.
Thursday 8th August
David M had kindly given me details of a good site for Water Ringlet, and it was towards here that we aimed the hire car this morning. I had already programmed Mrs.Nav with the GPS co-ordinates and we were soon en route, only to find that the road to the site had been closed. No access! This was a bit of a blow, and we had to rethink our plans, deciding to head up to the Col du Tourmalet instead. I have to say that this is not my favourite place: it heaves with tourists, cars, campervans, motorbikes and cyclists, but at least we managed to get a parking spot, which is far from guaranteed, especially in peak summer holiday season.
We got booted-up and set off along one of the trails, in glorious warm sunny weather. It was very quiet on the butterfly front, just a few Chalkhill Blues and Silver-spotted Skippers, a single Shepherd’s Fritillary, maybe ten Dark Green Fritillaries, half a dozen Small Heaths, one Small Copper, and particularly alarmingly, very few Erebias, apart from a dozen Pyrenees Brassy Ringlets and a few Piedmont Ringlets. Was the Pyrenees high altitude habitat having a similarly bereft butterfly season as elsewhere in western Europe?
After an hour or so, we decided to head down to slightly lower altitude. The species mix was similar to that on the Col itself, but overall numbers were better. There was a bit of a breeze blowing here, so we headed towards the lee side of a ridge, where a large, very dark Erebia took to the wing in front of us. You get a certain kind of feeling when you are looking at a butterfly that you haven’t seen before, and I was getting that feeling in spades off this butterfly! It took a while for it to settle, but once down I got a good look at it through binoculars – wow, what a cracking underside – my first ever Water Ringlet! Gorgeous!
We stayed here for a further hour and probably had half a dozen separate pronoe all told. They would appear on the wing, sometimes two in a single vista, fly around for a while, then disappear for a few minutes only to reappear again later. The Silver-spotted Skippers here were numerous and fresh, as were the Chalkies, but again, overall numbers and species diversity were not great.
In the afternoon we took a drive up to the famous Lac des Gloriettes, along with half of France. The car park was rammed, the road up was total chaos as people tried to turn round and come back down again, there were vehicles parked in every conceivable layby, on crazy rock faces, hanging off sheer drops; utter madness, and this was a weekday! We had no option but to retreat lower down, where we found a few beasts of interest such as a Large Blue, a Swallowtail, several Large Wall Browns and plenty of Silver-washed Fritillaries. We resolved to get up early for breakfast tomorrow and revisit the Lac, hoping to get a parking spot earlier on.
I don’t need to add that celebrations were in order that evening. I had a lifer in the bag on day one, and Bob had two (Water and Pyrenees Brassy Ringlets). We had planned to feast on Dauphinoise potatoes (tinned) and local sausages (fresh), but we hit another snag as the apartment, despite being generally well equipped, lacked a tin-opener…it also lacked a corkscrew, but I never travel abroad without one in my suitcase, so that particular disaster was neatly dodged! Our red wines went down a treat, as always, even if the sausages were rather lonely with just a bit of bread to accompany them. Sleep came easily afterwards.
Friday 9th August
We arrived back at the Lac des Gloriettes by 9am. Unbelievably the car park was already full, but we secured a spot in a pull in just below and were soon walking around this very popular and beautiful spot. It was full of walkers who seemed oblivious to the butterflies flying around them. We had a fine selection of species up here, including such delights as Apollo, Purple-shot Coppers, Turquoise, Chalkhill, Large, Common and Eros Blues, Lefebvre’s and Piedmont Ringlets, Olive and Marbled Skippers, to name a few, but no sign of our next most wanted, the Gavarnie Ringlet. Why not? Was gorgone gone? Already?
Several hours passed rapidly up here, and after lunch we were ready to escape the crowds and head somewhere a little more off-piste. The afternoon was spent in the relative tranquillity of the Ossoue valley, where again, butterfly numbers were well down on what might have been expected, but it was a worthwhile trip in that it produced the only sightings all week of the Yellow-spotted Ringlet, manto, f.constans, another half-lifer for Bob.
Tonight, we had stopped on the way home at the local supermarket to pick up a tin-opener, and Bob rustled up a superb meal of more local sausages, mushrooms and dauphinoise potatoes, the food of Kings, washed down with a bottle of Beaumes de Venise and a nice Cahors!
This was our last night in the apartment – tomorrow we were heading east towards the Neouvielle National Nature Reserve, to a site that, as the crow flies, was just 10 kilometres from our first base, yet took two and a half hours to drive to, such is the topography of this part of the high Pyrenees.
Saturday 10th and Sunday 11th August
Neouvielle is a wonderful area of France, one of my favourites, and we spent two whole days exploring here. Butterfly numbers were much higher than those we had encountered so far. Silver-spotted Skippers and Chalkhill Blues were around by the hundreds; I have never seen so many Silver-spotteds. There were often two, three or four individuals on a single thistle, and if you found a thistle that wasn’t occupied by one, it soon would be! Additional species such as Mountain Clouded Yellow, Bath White, Meadow Fritillary and Scarce Copper turned up for the first time this holiday, and Erebias were more common here than they had been so far. In particular, Neouvielle was teeming with Water Ringlets! After seeing half a dozen near Tourmalet on day one, we were thrilled to find them in ever-increasing abundance the higher we climbed. At around 1800m there were a couple of dozen flying near a stream in amongst grassy, heather-clad areas. Higher up just above 2000m we were in amongst treble figures of pronoe. They were all over the available nectar sources, strongly favouring thistles, hardheads and scabious flowers. It was not uncommon to see two or three on the same flowerhead. Adding a lifer to the list is always a joy, but seeing one in such abundance and properly getting to know it is one step beyond!
Other Erebias here included more Pyrenees Brassy Ringlets, another Lefebvre’s, Large Ringlet, Piedmont Ringlet, and Bright-eyed Ringlet, but still no Gavarnie yet. I was beginning to worry…
Bob and I have been intermittently travelling around Europe butterflying for two decades now, and we have had some amazing and highly memorable experiences over the years. We both have a fair record at finding those trickier species, occasionally tracking down the “needle in a haystack” individuals, and Bob was about to pull a rabbit out of the hat once again. I was busy photographing pronoe on a very productive and lively thistle patch when I got the call. Usually, it’s a “Pete?”, a questioning inflection at the end of my name, meaning Bob has seen something a bit different that needs investigating. The intonation is immediately recognisable. This time it was more of a “PETE! Get here!” Insistent and uncharacteristically confident! I didn’t hesitate. The rabbit in question turned out to be a female Gavarnie Ringlet, and he had pulled it, not out of his hat, but onto it!
What a brilliant result. He had saved the day and picked out what appeared to be the only remaining Gavarnie Ringlet in the Pyrenees this year! I felt obliged to return the favour. Bob has never seen a Camberwell Beauty. It has been his bogey species for years, as it once was mine. I had a spot in mind just down the road. We went and visited and walked up hill for some distance to an altitude of just below 2200m. Water Ringlets were equally abundant up here. We spent a couple of hours walking up and down, searching for that elusive Cambie. Just as we had given up and began our descent, I spotted something airborne in front of us above the road. It was gliding straight towards me, and I immediately knew what it was. Anyone who has watched a Camberwell Beauty in flight will attest to their magnificence on the wing. We watched it glide effortlessly up amongst the pines for several minutes, completely flat-winged; not once did it make a single wingbeat. At one point it teased us and looked as though it might come down to the ground, but it didn’t, and no photograph was possible. It didn’t matter. Just before it disappeared for good up over the trees it gave us a direct overhead pass, silhouetted perfectly just above us against the blue skies, showing off those gorgeous yellow borders and dark centre. Huge! Masterful! Wonderful!
Part Two to follow.
