www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

I was out walking along country path that lead to an old oak/beech/elm forest (Known locally as the Glen due to the river, the Glen Burn, running through it) and went though it, 21C and warm despite some cloud. As I was going there, saw several ringlets, a red admiral and 3-4 Udea lutealis and 2 large white, couldn't photograph red admiral as it flew too fast but would like to do so sometime this year. Nearby I found 1 meadow brown (first one I was able to photograph this year that actually let me photo):
I also found a Micropterix calthella feeding on a bramble flower. Never saw or heard of one being found in July before. Got a video of it feeding and amazing to see how fast its jaws move when feeding. Found this beside the river that runs through here. Image from video frame:
Also disturbed a Large Yellow Underwing from the same brambles. Couple of images of forest there: Here is a Double Dart I found here as well:
River that runs for 2 miles around here and out to Strangford Lough (where the river comes out at the lough, a rare freshwater snail was found by National Trust wardens and now the water quality is monitored not far from where I took this photo, to make sure its fine for life to survive in it)
Still looking for Dark Green or Silver Washed Fritillary here, not much is known about this forest but looks like a great place for them, quite a number of violets dotted about. Everytime I have been here (only a few times this year) it has been dull so not seen much butterflies.

Went up the path, along a path that has old oak trees along both sides with some alder and elms and one old birch tree. I went over a fence and into the large flower meadow on a big hill. There is loads of rosebay willowherb here, some places it grows really thick in places. There is also a few sparse willow trees dotted about and lots of birds-foot trefoil here. I was hoping to see common blues here, but didn't. I did disturb a shaded-broad bar (first I have seen this year)
Here is one area of the line of oak trees with Strangford Lough in distance:
Coming back along the meadow, saw 3 small tortoiseshell:
It was a good day, walked about 3 miles through forest, meadows and paths and took about 3 hours here. This area is very unlike other areas around here, ancient forests, old 3-4 acre old grassy scrub which is surrounded 3 sides by an old stone wall, has old balckthorn hedge and old dog roses, old oak woodland, rivers with old oak, beech, scots pine, Willow/ Birch woodland, flower meadows and field margins.

BTW, anyone know if its usual to start to see blackthorn with (sloe) berries starting to appear? The old blackthorn in the 3-4 acre area has berries starting to appear all over them. I have not seen berries before since not much blackthorn around my area, only one and its around 3 years old.

After a slightly disappointing day at Fermyn on Monday, I visited my local Bernwood Forest yesterday (Thurs 14th)

One oak tree in particular was 'teeming' with Purple Hairstreaks, and one female gave me a flash of her purple!
Although the wind was blowing the leaves about, I managed to move in with my macro lens and got this shot of her beautiful eyelashes:
Several Brimstones were on the wing (both sexes) and other species seen included Large & Small Skippers, Small White, Silver-washed Fritillary, Comma, Peacock, Red Admiral, White Admiral, Ringlet, Meadow Bown and Marbled White - quite a pleasing 13 in all.
Mike

Drove down to the Forest Farm nature reserve near Cardiff this morning and spent just over an hour and a half there before the clouds the weather forecast had predicted came tumbling in.

I was hoping to see a few White Letter Hairstreaks as this is the location that large numbers were seen at last year. Sadly, despite perfect conditions, I couldn't locate any but I did see four Purple Hairstreaks, all of which were centred around two separate mature oak trees. Finally, I managed to spot one at a lower level and to my delight this female was basking with wings open. I nearly got a Holly Blue open wing shot too, but just as I was zooming in on a basking male another Holly Blue came along and the pair went sailing off into the tree tops.

The species seen between 10.30am and 12.15pm were:

1. Meadow Brown 30-40
2. Small Skipper 20-30
3. Hedge Brown 10-15
4. Speckled Wood 10-15
5. Holly Blue 7
6. Large White 4
7. Red Admiral 4
8. Purple Hairstreak 4
9. Green Veined White 3
10. Peacock 3
11. Small Tortoiseshell 3
12. Small Copper 1
13. Large Skipper 1



You know you're in high summer when you start seeing lots of Hedge Browns



Finally, I got lucky. She was low down on an Ash leaf next to the big Oak tree.



She closed her wings for about 10 seconds then was off back up to the canopy.



Vanessid season seems to now be upon us. Three fresh Peacocks seen today along with this and three other Red Admirals.

I spent the afternoon at Denbies Hillside, Surrey, mainly looking for Chalk Hill Blue abs, but they all appeared normal.
In all I saw 17 species:

Small White
Large White
Dark Green Fritillary
Red Admiral
Marbled White
Gatekeeper
Ringlet
Meadow Brown
Small Heath
Small Copper
Common Blue
Chalk Hill Blue
Brown Argus
Small Skipper
Large Skipper
Essex Skipper

There were also 2 second-brood Dingy Skipper but these proved too belligerent to photograph.

Vince

millerd wrote:Thanks, Neil, she was a lovely butterfly. What are the characteristics that give it away from the underside?

Dave

More generous and rounded wing areas ~ built for carrying the egg load. The males have sharper wing angles and a more built for speed and agility needed when chasing off rival males and chasing down ( literally ) virgin females.

I have once or twice seen a heavily laden fairly fresh female alight on a Salix leaf and because of her weight, the leaf has curled down with the result that the ovum was laid on the underside of the leaf...that is not according to the users' manual of egg laying ... . The females rarely spend more than a few seconds laying the single egg. In and out of the bush quickly. I suspect the need for speed is because they would be vulnerable to birds and other predators who would regard the female PE as a tasty morsel and snap it up during that vulnerable second or two.

Thanks for the information - great to know the background. It makes what you see make much more sense.

Dave

Must have been hundreds of CHB at Burwell today - a lot of freshly-emerged butterflies - and very active at 8:00am; too warm... A lot of this going on...

Those first two CHB pics are great!

Cheers - you wouldn't want to see the other 997....

Early evening visit to Harmondsworth Moor, near Heathrow, just as the cloud arrived - typical timing. Not much around: several Meadow Browns, Gatekeepers (including one or two females), Small and Essex Skippers, and one Marbled White, a ghostly seni-transparent wraith wafting over the knapweed.

Dave

Apologies for late posting
Thanks to the fine weather on Monday 11th I went to Denbies after a short stint in Straits (no PE's that morning although I got to see a couple there the previous day). I'm disappointed that I didn't get to meet both Gibster and Susie, perhaps because I didn't stray too far from Steers' field which to me is the quietest spot away from dog walkers.
I've been visiting Denbies for around 8 years now and my usual route after entering Steers' field is to turn right towards the wood. Upon reaching the wood entrance, follow the grassy path down the field along the edge of the wood to get to the gate. Along this route you will see more species than anywhere else in Denbies with the exception of the Adonis blue. Over the years I've seen 26 different species including the surprise of a fresh White Letter Hairstreak feeding on Marjoram.
I noted there wasn't much of a mention for the Small Copper. For me I've never had such a feast in one sitting, about 2 dozen of the little fellows in that walk down to the gate. Lots of Brown Argus too. The downside to this SC fest was missing the chance to see aberrant Chalkhill Blue. There were plenty of male butterflies in my area but no obvious aberrants (not that I was looking too hard). Now that I know they're there I'll be specifically looking out for them on my next visit.

Dave McCormick wrote: BTW, anyone know if its usual to start to see blackthorn with (sloe) berries starting to appear? The old blackthorn in the 3-4 acre area has berries starting to appear all over them. I have not seen berries before since not much blackthorn around my area, only one and its around 3 years old.

the sloe where I live are nearly ready to pick

Big fat sloe berries in my hedge but they are still green at the moment.

Thanks vawn and Susie.

David M wrote:Drove down to the Forest Farm nature reserve near Cardiff this morning and spent just over an hour and a half there before the clouds the weather forecast had predicted came tumbling in.

Hi David,
in-between the showers yesterday afternoon (Saturday 16th July) I popped down to Forest Farm for about an hour. The weather was still a bit overcast but to add to your species was also a Painted Lady in the third field (furthest field from Asda's). P.S. I'm sick of this 'British summertime' weather
Michael

Hi Michael,

I'm getting a bit fed up with the weather as well.
Went out briefly yesterday between the showers but didn't last long. Spotted some of the usual suspects at a local spot, have just just updated my blog.

Cheers,

Neil.

I was at Copeland Island yesterday (about 18 miles away from Scotland or so) and there is three Islands, Copeland Island, Mew Island and Lighthouse Island (Mew Island has the lighthouse since they moved it from the Lighthouse Island since it wasn't a good place to be seen) the lighthouse is the brightest in the UK. Lighthouse Island has a RSPB bird observatory and someone I know who is part of the RSPB there, sometimes traps on the island and gets some good moths (a few vagrants from Scotland can appear here) see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copeland_Islands

Apparently during the 1700s a slave ship came by here wanting to stock up at the harbour. It had people taken from their homes from the Isle of Skye and were going to be taken to America as slaves. The Harbour master noticed something unusual, called the police and ended up with the slaves returned to their homes on Skye and the boat owners disappeared and were never seen again.

John Paul Jones (the founder of the American Navy, the man from Kirkcudbrightshire, Scotland) also had a sea battle near here (Although I don't remember much about it) and the Donaghadee harbour that is a few miles from here where I got the boat from) was built by John Rennie in 1819, the Scottish man who took the London Bridge and rebuilt it in Arizona. Yes I am not just a nature lover, I am also a history buff.

I went to the big island and it has sheep graising on it. It was dry when the boat left but about 5 minutes after we landed, it began to rain. Typical. I didn't bring my Canon 500D since its not working properly but few weeks I'll have a 600D so have to put up with this for a little longer, but I did bring a camera but quality isn't as good.

The island has a school on it (now disused) and a post box when people lived there as there used to be post transported via boats every day. There used to be people living here but now no one does and the only house is a stay for visitors. There is a small graveyard with a few graves and I think from what I saw, a manx shearwater took a rabbit burrow beside a grave and I saw bones, could have been human dug up by rabbits or shearwaters, didn't want to think about it.

Lots of big jellyfish at the edge of the island and coming onto the shore (not sure yet of which type they are) and there was about 20 common seal basking on the rocks beside the island where we docked. What I saw:

A couple of Manx Shearwater (and a dead young one) lots of gulls (some were attacking me, but I didn't realise I walked into a part of the island covered in sedge grasses that had young gulls in nests in the sedges which I couldn't see, I moved away then), a grouse which flew up from the bracken. On the east coast there was eider ducks with young duckings, two families with 3 ducklings each), common seals (about 30, a few on east side, most on west side), quite a number of Arctic terns (which should be leaving soon back to the Antarctic) here. There was some oystercatchers, lapwings and a single stock dove

There is lots of rabbits (which is how manx shearwater do so well here due to number of rabbit burrows they use here) saw quite a number of dead ones although didn't see any birds of prey that are noted to be here, not many trees on the island so maybe they breed elsewhere and just pass here. Also saw a Mediterranean Gull (very like black headed gull but head colour is black and black headed is more brownish, also bill is thicker in Mediterranean and plumage is also lighter grey), Black Guillemots, Cormorants (around 7-10), Swallows (about 6) and a small bird which I have to ID (image below). One thing that is all over parts of the island (which looks really out of place for obvious reasons) is Himalayan Balsam. Thistles cover the island, as does bracken and sedge grasses. There is also areas of yellow iris and bracken covers the east slopes and some other areas. (didn't get to see the north side of the island)

Not much lepidoptera life but here is some images anyway:

Young Gull:
Arctic Tern:
Cormorants:
Oystercatcher:
Common Seals:
Gulls:
Mew Island Lighthouse:
Is this a reed bunting? I saw several on an elder on east side of the island:

Silver Washed a-courting

Late report from Friday (I was on my way home and stopped off for 10 mins at Woodhenge shhhhh! Smessex skippers, and a definite female Small. More Meadow Brown and fewer Marbled Whites, single comma - more details and photos on Personal Diary to follow.

Today Ringlet in my garden - a first

Five Rivers this afternoon - singles of Comma, Red Admiral, Peacock, GV White, fewer Smessex Skippers, only 3 Marbled White, 20+ Meadow Brown, 2 Small White, 3 male, 2 female Gatekeepers, Brown Argus and Common Blue - again more details and photos on personal diary if I get a chance

Have a goodun

Wurzel

Hi Dave,

thanks for the 'virtual tour' of the islands, great bit of history detail in there! Your mystery bird is indeed a Reed Bunting. Only other thing to point out is that your Cormorants are actually Shags. Check the bill shape and head profile for starters.

Cheers mate,

Gibster (notably seeing very little of late, Small Skippers in cop being a highlight today amongst numerous downpours)