www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

I'm glad you enjoy the pictures, David and Kev. That's their main purpose! And thank you, too, for the welcome to Minnie, Lee!

The last few days have been grim, with cloud, rain, thunder &c., so I've been gently teaching Minnie the essential vocabulary needed for butterflying, using the same illogical mixture of French and English I used with Asha (she now knows 'au pied', 'viens', 'stay', 'assis', and 'go go go!'). She came with 'non!' built in, which is useful. It might be a little while before I can concentrate on photographing butterflies, even if the sun does shine, as I think it will pay dividends to use the early walks for her education; but she does seem to be a quick learner.



Guy

Oh Guy what a delightful little dog - I wish you many happy hours of butterflying together
I spent my teens, formative butterfly years, with a very similar Jack Russell as my constant companion.
After many dog- less years I gave acquired a springer spaniel, Flossie, who I find is great company - she even flushed my long tailed blue last year so I owe her a debt of gratitude Fortunately I only have to teach her English
Kind Regards
Mark

Jack Russells were what I was brought up with too. We had one from 1970 (when I was two) all the way till 1984 and then another from 1985 until I moved into my own place.

I know how much you love dogs, Guy, so I'm sure you'll cherish your precious time with this one.

It's occasionally struck me that lepidopterists' behaviour in good grassland habitat can be quite dog-like, chasing here and there after the latest object of interest. I wonder which crosses a field in the least straight line?

I've never had a JR before - always mongrels as family dogs and my last dog here in Switzerland was a border collie. But I'm glad to know there's a JR fan club out there!

I would say, Matsukaze, that there are well behaved and badly behaved lepidopterists, as there are dogs! Either way, if you walk across a meadow in Switzerland you will have a landowner shouting at you very soon!

There was fresh snow all over the mountains this morning:





I promise not to append a picture of Minnie to every post from now on, but hey! she's new!



Guy

Being Swiss, shouldn’t Minnie be able to understand instructions in three languages?

If you could train her to sniff out Erebia Christi, you may be onto something.

R

On those grounds she should be able to master four languages, Roger (French, German, Italian and Romansh) but the fact is few Swiss speak more than two of these and many have only one. I'll be happy if she just knows what I'm saying to her!

Although there was a glimmer of sun this morning, it is still cold and gloomy here. In the afternoon I went to check my brown hairstreak eggs/larvae. First I had a look at the eggs. There were still several unhatched, though one had clearly given birth to a parasite since my last visit:

22nd April:


1st May:


The end leaves of the branches are still furled and I suspect that's where most of the larvae are hanging out. I only found one:







I think that's second instar but I'm happy to be corrected. It's striking how far behind these wild Swiss larvae are (assuming they are all at more or less the same stage) compared with the captive ones recently shown on UK Butterflies.

Guy

It was miserable again today, but I had arranged to meet a student, Markus, from Munich for a butterfly hunt so we went looking for caterpillars. Amazingly, despite the rain we (or principally he, as he clearly had far better eyes than me!) found a lot of roosting butterflies, including a dozen or more green-underside blues, common blue, baton blue, Provençal short-tailed blue, grizzled skipper, Oberthür's grizzled skipper, small heath and Glanville fritillary. We didn't find any poplar admiral or lesser purple emperor caterpillars, despite much searching, but did find two white admiral cats and Markus also managed to find some blue-spot hairstreak eggs. For a cold, rainy day, it was remarkably productive!

My camera doesn't function well in the gloom, but here are a few piccies:


(Green-underside blue)


(Oberthür's grizzled skipper - it was roosting but opened its wings briefly after I picked it up and moved it)


(Oberthür's grizzled skipper)


(Glanville fritillary)


(Baton blue)


(White admiral cat)


(White admiral cat)


(parasitised blue-spot hairstreak egg)


(healthy egg, with Minnie foraging in the background!)

Guy

Great stuff - well done on finding the White Admiral cats!

Cheers,

- Pete

Wonderful stuff, Guy. Sometimes it's days like these that provide the greatest rewards because they are so unexpected.

Thanks for the encouragement!

I located a second local brown hairstreak caterpillar today, as well as relocating the first, giving me a little more chance of following at least one through to its final instar. Both are still tiny. This picture shows the size of today's find:





Guy

Minnie had her first real road test today. I cycled her down the hill in my backpack and along the valley to two different sites; and it was sunny all day, so she had her first taste of real butterflying:


(Glanville fritillary)

I don't think she was particularly impressed with either of the southern white admiral cats we found (Markus from Munich and I):





But what really did impress her were these:









I had no intention of looking for cardinals, as it is far too early, but Matt alerted me to one he had seen this morning and I immediately dropped everything, popped Minnie in her backpack and zoomed off to where he had seen it, with very little confidence I would be able to relocate it. In the event, I found 4 different individuals. They are obviously locally bred - two were at the same site I saw them last year and the other two were not far away.

So on her first trip, Minnie saw Switzerland's rarest breeding butterfly. Not bad!

Guy

That's a gorgeous butterfly Guy and looks like you've got yourself a cracking little dog

We have a cat also called Minnie, born in Ireland about ten years ago. She is reluctant to understand English English, Scottish English or even Irish English.

Minnie was born with only three and a half legs and has a gait more like a hopping rabbit than a cat. Still she is far more belligerent than her able bodied companion, Fluffy (don't blame me for the name - I inherited Fluffy as part of the package that came with my wife!) Fluffy just ignores the visiting "White Whisker" but Minnie sees him off very quickly.

Jack

Congratulations on acquiring Minnie. I hope you'll both be very happy together (as seems to be the case already ). What is the story behind her arrival?

Guy. Trying to recall what you last dog was called. How long did you have that one?

Jack

To answer all the dog questions at once ...

My last dog (who has always been my avatar on UK Butterflies) was called Asha. She came from the local SPA (société pour la protection des animaux) and had a very sad past. For the first year I had her she would regularly wake up out of nightmares and attack me (we both slept on the floor, next to each other) - and then regret it profoundly when she realised who she'd bitten. I worked hard with her and she became a lovely and loving friend. She died aged 8 (I adopted her when she was 1) of kidney failure. I couldn't take another dog while my aged cat was still alive, as he had supported me after Asha's death and I owed him a peaceful retirement as my new best friend. He died a few weeks ago and the kennels where I used to leave him when I left the country offered me, for no charge, Minnie. She has a happy past but was the only one in a litter of Jack Russells who hadn't found a home and apparently she hadn't really found her place in the family either - she needed placing. The staff at the kennels were very happy she was coming to live with me and I am, of course, very happy she joined my little dysfunctional community of me and cardboard Buffy too!

Guy

Poor Asha, my dog also used to have nightmares but if I whistle he settles and now he's older it doesn't happen unless we're apart for too long - he loves his mum and no one else is quite the same , she was lucky to find such a compassionate home as has Minnie

You and your Buffy! Lol

Minnie had her first real road test today. I cycled her down the hill in my backpack and along the valley to two different sites

The mind boggles. Surely there are some cartoonists on ukb?

Guy cycling down mountain with camera (artificially oversize) slung round neck with a dog in backpack. Cows with bells in the background. Swiss chalets with flags a-fluttering. And of course swarms of butterflies.

Guy's T-shirt should of course have a picture of Buffy on it This one?
http://comicartcommunity.com/gallery/de ... e_id=33604

Jack

Excellent Cardinal shots Guy.
I see now that since we left Evian-les-bains on Saturday 3rd after our week's holiday in your area, the sun has come out!! Ce n'est pas juste. The weather really hampered outdoor stuff all last week - I will have to return to the Haute Savoie when the forecast is more reliable.
Cheers, Chris