May 2010 sightings

[lee3764]

Hi all,

We had a 'boiling' afternoon field trip for Cornwall Butterfly Conservation at Tuckingmill, nr St Breward on Bodmin Moor, mid Cornwall today 22nd May from 1:00pm onwards & saw 30+ Pearl-Bordered Fritillaries of which ALL BUT 1 were perfectly fresh! I assume therefore that on the 3 Bodmin Moor sites for the Pearl-Bordered Fritillary in Cornwall the species is really only now emerging in any numbers due to late Spring weather. Also saw 7+ O.Tips, 6+ G.V.Whites, 4 small coppers, 1 Holly Blue, 8+ Small Whites, and my son Robert Slaughter (aged 6) found a female earwig under a stone protecting & rounding up her brood of 20+ baby earwigs!! I've never seen that before! You learn something everytime at one of our fieldtrips!!! My wife & 2 young sons aged 4 & 6 walked round this site in scorching hot conditions (well 26 degrees - 79 farenheight in shade & very sweaty & humid!). Everyone had enough after 3 hours & called it a day due to the heat. The site is being managed well & looks very good for the long term security of this species in Cornwall thankfully.
Cheers all,
Lee Slaughter (Cornwall Butterfly Conservation Field Trip Organiser).
>

[David M]

Beautiful day here today in SE Wales. Caught the bus to Brynmawr and walked the 12 miles back to Abergavenny following the course of the old railway line. The tally was (in descending order of abundance):

1. Green veined white - 50+
2. Speckled Wood - 20+
3. Small White 10-20
4. Large White 10-20
5. Orange Tip 10-20
6. Dingy Skipper 10-20
7. Common Blue 5-10
8. Small Heath 4
9. Peacock 2
10. Tortoiseshell 1
11. Brimstone (male) 1

Orange Tips could well have numbered far more, as there were fields full of mayflower but at a distance it's impossible to distinguish female OTs from GV/Small Whites.

Dingy Skippers were interesting. I'd never seen this species before but knew they were to be found around Clydach Gorge. My efforts to photograph them were in vain at the start because they seem to want to alight for only a few seconds. However, I chanced on an old set of tyre tracks where the mud was still moist and there were a handful fluttering around there taking fluid from the ground. I managed to get a couple of decent shots (with a digital camera) but had it not been for this patch of damp ground I would have come home empty handed:



I've seen plenty of Large/Small/Silver Spotted Skippers, but this species flies with a slightly more delicate nuance. They're easier to track but harder to pin down as they seem to suffer from Meadow Brownitis - i.e never settling for more than a handful of seconds.

The first butterfly I saw was a Brimstone in the streets of Brynmawr. I thought I'd see plenty more but once again this butterly remains aggravating. I know they are great wanderers, but surely there must be some kind of habitat that attracts large numbers of them? has anyone ever seen more than two or three in any one place?

[Gibster]

Hi David

If you want to see more Brimstones come to Surrey!!! Bucketloads of 'em round here

Just (cautiously) wondering if some of your Large Whites might actually have been female Brimstones? I've hardly seen any Large Whites down here so far, and I keep leaping at distant/brief Brimstones just in case! Course I'm a complete nutter when it comes to things like that...

All the very best, and I'm glad you got your skipper pics...that was a heck of a walk you did!

[Cotswold Cockney]

The first butterfly I saw was a Brimstone in the streets of Brynmawr. I thought I'd see plenty more but once again this butterly remains aggravating. I know they are great wanderers, but surely there must be some kind of habitat that attracts large numbers of them? has anyone ever seen more than two or three in any one place?

After hibernation is not the best time to see them in numbers although locally I've seen more this spring than in many past. Females looking for foodplant quite numerous this spring. Best time is in August when the freshly emerged Brimstones are keen to feed up well before the long dormant period. These butterflies can live up to a year.

In the woodlands during August, look for clumps of flowering Teasels which are a great favourite for nectar feeding Brimstones. I've seen up to two dozen in local woodlands on these plants, all pristine fresh condition and far more approachable then than the hyper active incessant spring wanderers.
..

[Gruditch]

As reported elsewhere, incredibly high numbers of Brown Argus, Common Blue, and even Adonis Blue, on the Southern Downs. Now if it would just cool down a bit, I wouldn't have to be up at 5.30am to photograph the damned things.

Regards Gruditch

[NickB]

Nice one! Pays to get up early
I arrived at Totternhoe at 6:00am today, in an attempt to beat the heat.
Not as successful as Gary with the photography, but did manage to find some Dukes.

Also large numbers of Common Blue and Dingy Skipper; a few Small Blue showing. Also the odd Green Hairsteak, OT and Small White...

Also found a couple of very pale Dukes similar to some I found last year - possibly ab. leucodes

[Ian Pratt]

Had a walk along Bonchurch Down near Ventnor with my wife Sally this afternoon and bumped in to the IOW Butterfly recorder Andy Butler and his wife Enid who have been doing transects here for many years. They believe this is the most Adonis Blues they have ever seen - over 1000 plus a good number of Brown Argus, Common Blue and Small Heath plus the odd Wall Brown, Glanville Fritillary and Green Hairstreak.

[David M]

Hi David

If you want to see more Brimstones come to Surrey!!! Bucketloads of 'em round here

Just (cautiously) wondering if some of your Large Whites might actually have been female Brimstones? I've hardly seen any Large Whites down here so far, and I keep leaping at distant/brief Brimstones just in case! Course I'm a complete nutter when it comes to things like that...

All the very best, and I'm glad you got your skipper pics...that was a heck of a walk you did!

Don't think so. I'm always very wary of registering Large Whites as they can vary in size and even at fairly close distance one could mistake them for a Small White. Brimstones have a distinctive flight pattern and the females have a weak green tea appearance even from a fair distance. I don't think I've ever seen more than 3 in any one spot yet individuals seem to pop up randomly all over the place (they're even in the Isle of Man, where my mother lives).

I was much more adept at identification as a child, though this was mainly due to having a net handy so if in doubt I could nab the little blighter in question for a closer look. Of course, you can't do that nowadays so you have to rely on either getting very close or seeing them settle. As we all know, Whites/Brimstones tend to flutter about, settling only briefly before moving on. If only they could all be more like the good ole Peacock, which will readily bask for several minutes on flower, greenery or earth!

[David M]

The first butterfly I saw was a Brimstone in the streets of Brynmawr. I thought I'd see plenty more but once again this butterly remains aggravating. I know they are great wanderers, but surely there must be some kind of habitat that attracts large numbers of them? has anyone ever seen more than two or three in any one place?

After hibernation is not the best time to see them in numbers although locally I've seen more this spring than in many past. Females looking for foodplant quite numerous this spring. Best time is in August when the freshly emerged Brimstones are keen to feed up well before the long dormant period. These butterflies can live up to a year.

In the woodlands during August, look for clumps of flowering Teasels which are a great favourite for nectar feeding Brimstones. I've seen up to two dozen in local woodlands on these plants, all pristine fresh condition and far more approachable then than the hyper active incessant spring wanderers.
..

Thanks for the advice, though whenever I venture out in late summer they seem to be equally thin on the ground.

I'll definitely keep an eye out for Teasels though. They're that big, stringy thistle type flower with the bulbous head, aren't they?

[Gibster]

Just back from a very hot day wandering Denbies Hillside in Surrey - loads of Adonis Blues (100s) along with with Common Blues (30+), Brown Arguses (Argi???)(8+), Green Hairstreaks (4+), singletons of Holly Blue (ovipositing on Dogwood), Small White, Speckled Wood, Peacock, Red Admiral, Orange-tip, Brimstones (10+), Small Heaths (30+), Dingy Skippers (20+), Large White (2), Burnet Companion (10+), Mother Shipton (2), NB 5-spot Burnet (100s, 1 with the red spots running into each other), 6-spot Burnet larvae (10+), Lace Border (2), Lesser Treble Bar, Clouded Buff (1) followed by a jaunt to a site "kinda near to Chiddingfold" where we had 20+ Wood Whites, 30+ Small Heath, 30+ Common Blues, 10+ Dingy Skippers, 1 or 2 Grizzled Skippers, 3 Green Hairstreaks, 2 Small Coppers, a very close singing Nightingale, 3 Mandarins overhead and severe sunburn throughout...must pack the sun lotion next time, lol!!!!

A most enjoyable day, best of the sesason yet in fact. Puts us both on 23 species for the year...we're getting there!!!!

See our website for details of our Big Year!!!

[Butterflymax]

Hi. Thank you to the member who directed me to the attachment tab. All being well here is the Comma with the heavy markings that I mentioned a week ago. A possible subspecies? Any comments are welcome. I went for another walk along Great Central Walk today (well, Sunday afternoon) this time along the Ashlawn Cutting section, as I understood there is a colony of Green Hairstreaks there. Having never seen a hairstreak of any kind (nor a fritillary for that matter) I felt optimistic, given the good weather, but was ultimately disappointed. The dominant species on GCW today were Large and Small Whites, followed by Orange Tips (the Rugby variety never ever land on anything it seems). Where have all the Peacocks and Small Tortoiseshells gone, I also wondered? I encountered a solitary Comma (with regular markings) which was very friendly and hopped onto my shoulder after I'd taken a few photos of it, and got my first (but not great) photo of a Common Blue. Also spotted my first Speckled Wood (which was the dominant species at GCW last September) of 2010.
Thanks to everyone concerned for a great website

[NickB]

Hi. Thank you to the member who directed me to the attachment tab. All being well here is the Comma with the heavy markings that I mentioned a week ago. A possible subspecies?
Thanks to everyone concerned for a great website

Hi
The Comma is within the normal variations of colour - I have seen specimens just like yours, with darker markings

but as I said, this seems a normal variation....
N
PS - for info on British species and aberrations - The Cockayne Index is a good place to look...
http://www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/ ... index.html

[Trev Sawyer]

My wife and I drove up to the Scottish Highlands last Wednesday, in the hope of finding Chequered Skippers

We had booked the trip a couple of months ago and had been very worried that the cool spring weather would have held the butterfly back by a few days and we might arrive a day or two too early. Still... "He who dares Rodney, he who dares"

Thursday was dull and mizzly but after much patient searching, I finally spotted one in the grass - fresh out of the wrapper!
We took loads of photos of the underside, but however long we waited, the insect would not open its wings. I finally had to resort to "huffing" warm air over it.... By the time it obliged, I was feeling very dizzy
We found a second one later in the afternoon and a third on Friday a few miles to the East, together with a single (fresh!) Pearl-Bordered fritillary.
Definitely worth the 1000+ mile trip in the car - and the weather was perfect.
Yvonne got this photo with her compact camera... It had obvioulsy even combed it's hair for us!



Trev

[Jack Harrison]

Well done Trev.

This picture of mine taken last week shows typical Small Copper courtship - female on left



Jack

[NickB]

Jack - I don't know what the picture looks like on your screen - but on mine you can tell that you have tweaked the Contrast down (or played with the levels, etc) - and it gives a grey, washed-out look to the result...Do others see it that way? ( I remember on your old camera you used that setting ...)
N

[ChrissyM]

The small coppers had moved on from the courtship stage in my image

[Jack Harrison]

Nick

My nephew Chris, a University Lecturer with a job that includes teaching PhotoShop, is currently staying with me. He has looked at that image on his computer and can see nothing wrong at all – certainly he doesn’t see it as being any more or less washed out than the other photos in that thread.

Chris respectfully suggests that the problem is at you end Nick.

Jack

[Padfield]

As an ex-university lecturer, who used to teach Kierkegaard's pseudonymous writings, I reckon that picture looks fine on my iPhone. But then again, as Johannes Climacus (one of K's pseudonyms) would doubtless say, 'Truth is subjectivity'.

Guy

[NickB]

Nick
Chris respectfully suggests that the problem is at you end Nick.
Jack

That's no surprise
- but, objectively, HAVE you done a lot of reducing the contrast or playing with levels in-camera or in post-production...?

N

[Jack Harrison]

Here’s the original (just resized).

The pale grass bottom right is RGB 254:254:254, ie right on limits (255:255:255) and the darkest shadows are 16:19:0, ie not far off being totally black. So I darkened the pale grass to reduce the overall unbalanced effect and then cropped.

I will concede that a little more contrast in this image would not have gone amiss, as per this one.


I think I was having problems in my computer room seeing the screen properly with the bright light outside.

Jack