Padfield

[Jack Harrison]

Many of your pictures Guy are stunningly sharp and clear(and I do understand that the "record" shots might not always be). Remind me please about the camera you use.

Jack

[Padfield]

Until last December I used a Canon Powershot A710 IS but it was just beginning to behave irregularly and Tim Cowles's identical camera recently gave out on him. So I upgraded to the Powershot SX130 IS (£150, with a £20 cash-back as a promotion when it came out). The large tortoiseshell in the previous selection was taken from about 10m, and was snatched. The green-veined white was about 3m away. The others were all photographed from 1m. For detailed close-up work I use macro, but the quality at 1m, without macro (using just zoom) is quite sufficient for illustrating my web diaries.

I really do appreciate the quality obtainable with expensive cameras, but I love the lightness and convenience of cheap compacts. Canon makes remarkably good budget cameras.

Guy

[Jack Harrison]

...Powershot SX130 IS...

I’ve looked a the specification and reviews (and potential results) are very much on a par with the Panasonic Lumix FZ38 that I own. However, the Canon is a little cheaper. The ultimate telephoto isn’t quite as great as the Lumix but I find in practice that I rarely use that with my Lumix. That Canon is obviously a good camera but doesn’t feature an angled screen (nor does my Lumix) which I have always found a superb feature on other cameras I have owned.

You again showed great tact there Guy with your comments about DSLRs. Yes, the ultimate performance MUST be better than with a compact but I for one couldn’t handle that massive weight around my arthritic neck. Moreover with a compact, you don’t have that hassle of needing lots of interchangeable lens with the attendant risk of dust and various other bits of dirt getting into the camera.

Jack

[Padfield]

I have yet to see how the SX130 IS deals with small butterflies, but its central focus seems very directable and I don't foresee any problems. The initial rather wide-angle focal length makes the 12x zoom less impressive than it might be.

I visited my February red admiral site today, in bright sunshine but with a chilly wind dispersing hotspots. A single small tortoiseshell flew, but no admirals, despite a 45 minute wait at their favoured slope. Impossible to draw any firm conclusions from this quick visit, but I strongly suspect those February sightings to have been something of a midwinter dream, that has evaporated now the world is waking out of its sleep. Had the insects gone into hibernation a few hundred kilometres further south they might have been reproductively successful and passed on their genes to the next generation. As it is, I think a northern winter is simply too long. I'll check again before the new wave of immigrants obscures the picture.

Guy

[Jack Harrison]

Guy wrote:

As it is, I think a northern winter is simply too long.

I'm sure that you know Guy that northern winter is actually shorter than southern winter as perihelion occurs in early January (this year on 3rd January).

Explanation for the non-scientists. Perihelion is the point in the earth's orbit round the sun when it is closest to the sun and consequently moves fastest in its orbit.

Jack

[Padfield]

And I'm equally sure you know I meant northern Europe as opposed to southern Europe, Jack!

'Tis true, the northern hemisphere enjoys a shorter winter. More ironic still, and for the same reason, solar days are longer during the northern winter (the earth has to rotate a little bit more for the same meridian to line up with the sun).

You could probably make a good living zooming around the world giving school presentations on aviation, meteorology and analemmas, Jack. Stick in a few butterfly photos and you've got it all!

Guy

[Padfield]

The first spring nettles are appearing in my village, a month after the first small tortoiseshells flew here. Tortoiseshells were flying near them today. It will be interesting to see when the larval nests appear.



Guy

[Matsukaze]

If it is lack of nectar that is the problem for red admirals in the winter, surely they should survive better in urban areas where there are winter-flowering plants available?

[Padfield]

If it is lack of nectar that is the problem for red admirals in the winter, surely they should survive better in urban areas where there are winter-flowering plants available?

Pooling the data from all our observations this spring should help us to answer this question!

There is a botanic garden close to my red admiral site but I've never actually been there. The red admirals were not nectaring at all when I saw them.

Guy

[Piers]

The first spring nettles are appearing in my village, a month after the first small tortoiseshells flew here. Tortoiseshells were flying near them today. It will be interesting to see when the larval nests appear.
Guy

Have you looked for any egg-masses Guy? Emerald masses of summer promise...

Felix.

[Padfield]

At lunchtime today, a comma flew in my local woods. No peacocks or brimstones yet, though I have had reports of brimstones lower down the mountain. Cycling back home (c. 1000m), I saw a Queen of Spain cross the road ahead of me and set off across a meadow. Naturally, I jumped off my bike and followed it, getting a few record shots, but it was clearly in 'dispersal mode' and hardly ever paused for breath. It will doubtless have flown up from the Valley - the first of many. By high summer Queens will be breeding throughout the mountains.

Guy

[Padfield]

Very windy and overcast in the valley by late morning. Only Queens flew in any numbers, with a very few small tortoiseshells thrown in. Being strong fliers, Queens appreantly don't mind the wind.

Here's a lonely Glanville fritillary caterpillar taking a walk over a bare meadow:





He was constantly moving and quite difficult to photograph.

This bee has been shopping:



Finally, a Queen brightening up a grey day. Better make this my last Queen photo...



Guy

[Zonda]

Really nice crisp shots Guy. I've found that things crawling on the ground are really difficult to photograph. For the last two days, i've been trying to get a half decent shot of an Oil Beetle.

[Padfield]

it is now unambiguously spring in the mountains. The woods are alive with all sorts of flowers, including cowslips, oxlips, primroses and just about everything in between (I think a lot of hybridisation goes on in Primula).


(Oxlips)


(A cowslip on the same bank)

The first white butterbur are flowering:



Butterflies were on the wing today too, with male brimstones patrolling the rides, small tortoiseshells hanging in there still, having shot their bolt a month ago, a single red admiral nectaring on sallow and a single comma. No peacocks flying yet.

Guy

[Padfield]

A short walk in the valley brought my year total to 13 species, all of them (nominally) British.

Target for the day was grizzled skipper, which was flying in small numbers in scattered colonies. Here are three different individuals:







Even more springlike, the first male orange tips were restlessly patrolling woodland edges, occasionally stopping very briefly on violets (not a good butterfly photographer's nectar plant, because each flower gives just a few seconds' opportunity!):



Large tortoiseshells were in evidence, gliding around majestically and also rarely stopping today (in fact, it was a lousy day for photography, for some reason!):





The first small whites have joined the green-veined whites:



Queen of Spain fritillaries have now reached almost plague proportions. I stood over a small corner of vineyard and tried to count how many there were in my field of vision. Answer: at least fifty! The ground was heaving with them - I don't think I've ever seen so many.

Two peacocks were my first for the year and a single Camberwell beauty was my first of that species too. Unfortunately, I put it up before I saw it (they are surprisingly well camouflaged from the underside) and it circled then flew up and off, so no photos.

Small tortoiseshells are still around but some are very definitely on their last legs, having been flying since January!



Finally, just as I was about to rush back for the train, a Bath white crossed the path ahead of me, flying in quite determined fashion against a strong wind. I gave chase and got a couple of distant, hasty, blurred record shots - this is my earliest ever Bath white:





He then went on his way and I caught my train.

Guy

[Jack Harrison]

You really know how to p*ss us off Guy. Wow! A train service on a Sunday - that's quite amazing. And I bet they were on time.

Jack

[NickMorgan]

It is interesting that your butterbur seems to be at about the same stage as it is here in SE Scotland. Primroses and cowslips are nowhere near as advanced!
Thanks for sharing your butterflies with us. I haven't seen any yet this year!

[Padfield]

Nick: one of the beauties of Switzerland is that it magically combines Alpine and Mediterranean, delivering the best of both. I live pretty much on the cusp.

Jack: trains run on Sundays here, on time, and at roughly a quarter of UK fares. I don't drive and have absolutely no need to!

I'm off on Tuesday to Málaga for a few days, before heading back to the UK. I need better photos of Euchloe crameri and Tomares ballus in particular and thanks to EasyJet this little detour costs me little more than a few rounds in a London pub.

Guy

[NickB]

Jack, having visited Guy and seen what a fabulous country Switzerland is for butterflies, I can only concur with his analysis. In one afternoon we went from baking heat in the Rhone valley floor to sub-glacial alpine meadows. The fact that every village (however remote and isolated at the head of the valley) is visited by the yellow post-bus every day is something we could learn from and does make it possible to move around on public transport; though meeting one coming down a narrow mountain road for the first time, when they have right-of-way, is an insurance-excess nightmare in a hire-car! The trains (as Guy mentioned) are also clean and efficient and DO run on-time !
Seeing Guy's pictures makes me impatient for our season to get started too; and that Q-o-S also reminds me of the last day we were there - a Q-o-S, radiating back the sun's rays, as it basked on a grey rock outcrop - priceless!
Enjoy your sunny break Guy and thanks for triggering that particular memory

[Padfield]

Come back some time, Nick!

I was enjoying Traplican's pages on Viola alba the other day and then, quite by coincidence, found what I think is the same species in my local woods today. In the past I'd always thought the occasional white violet was simply an albino dog violet.



I forgot to mention that the black kites have been back in town for the last week:



These birds are commonest around the lake, where the air is sometimes filled with their whinnying calls, but they also extend their reach up into the mountains.

Guy