Re: David M
Posted: Sun Oct 01, 2023 6:45 pm
Friday 15th September – Amazing spectacle…
Another fine day, and with the weather forecast suggesting a deterioration in the period to follow, I travelled down to Aberthaw Beach again to see if I could catch up with more Clouded Yellows.
The waste ground behind the sea defences is full of flowering brassicae right now:
Unsurprisingly, this means it is also full of Pierids:
It was host to at least 8 Clouded Yellows too; maybe even as many as 12. It was hard to count as they would regularly interact with one another, with four swirling around each other at one point.
This is easily the most I’ve ever seen at a site in Wales, although again all of them were males meaning that it was hard going getting near them. I had time though, and with patience, I occasionally got an image of one at rest:
I took plenty of ‘airshots’ – these are usually extremely blurred but occasionally one or two turns out reasonably clear:
I counted 15 Painted Ladies here too. They are suddenly becoming quite common:
There were also 8 Red Admirals and 2 very fresh-looking Small Tortoiseshells:
13 Meadow Browns still hanging on, along with a couple of Common Blues:
Two Small Coppers completed the list:
This last fortnight has been quite exceptional, with temperatures regularly exceeding 25c and winds remaining very light. Probably been the finest first half of September in my lifetime from a weather perspective, and certainly my best for domestic Clouded Yellows.
Another fine day, and with the weather forecast suggesting a deterioration in the period to follow, I travelled down to Aberthaw Beach again to see if I could catch up with more Clouded Yellows.
The waste ground behind the sea defences is full of flowering brassicae right now:
Unsurprisingly, this means it is also full of Pierids:
It was host to at least 8 Clouded Yellows too; maybe even as many as 12. It was hard to count as they would regularly interact with one another, with four swirling around each other at one point.
This is easily the most I’ve ever seen at a site in Wales, although again all of them were males meaning that it was hard going getting near them. I had time though, and with patience, I occasionally got an image of one at rest:
I took plenty of ‘airshots’ – these are usually extremely blurred but occasionally one or two turns out reasonably clear:
I counted 15 Painted Ladies here too. They are suddenly becoming quite common:
There were also 8 Red Admirals and 2 very fresh-looking Small Tortoiseshells:
13 Meadow Browns still hanging on, along with a couple of Common Blues:
Two Small Coppers completed the list:
This last fortnight has been quite exceptional, with temperatures regularly exceeding 25c and winds remaining very light. Probably been the finest first half of September in my lifetime from a weather perspective, and certainly my best for domestic Clouded Yellows.