Cheers Dave
![Very Happy :D](./images/smilies/icon_biggrin.gif)
After the bad year for them at Collard last year it was geat to see them bounce back
Cheers Trevor
![Very Happy :D](./images/smilies/icon_biggrin.gif)
I put off and put off the trip unitl last year, and then it turned out to be surprisingly easy
Cheers Bugboy
Cheers Pauline
![Very Happy :D](./images/smilies/icon_biggrin.gif)
I don't think they'd let me loose with a shovel on the site
Cheers dilettante...I think
Cheers Mike for agreement with the very kind comments
Kingston Lacey 21-06 – After the High...
As my Brother in-law was down we all made a visit to Kingston Lacey. I was still on a high after my Large Blues and Heaths and so I was hoping for lots but ended up scratching around for butterflies...
The day started well enough with a Small Tort near the entrance while all the females disappeared to the loo and that is usually a good portent of what is to come. But this time it went really quiet. There were no whites or browns on the lawns or borders, the Fernery didn’t have any Brimstones or Specklies and he Avenue of trees was a complete blank. Finally at the very end of the Avenue just before the track bent round and through the woods a few Meadow Browns flitted about amongst the small patches of longer grass; but that was it. I even took to photographing flies, various bugs and Hoverflies just so that I could have something to show for the day! I couldn’t decide if this was just the June gap, the weather was ‘wrong’ (cooler than it should be, patchy sun and the threat of rain) or a mixture of both. The fact that Meadow Browns were out suggested probably just the weather...
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Over at the kitchen garden didn’t get any better with a single white flying about while we ate lunch and only 3 more Small Torts flapping around in the Allotments. I did manage a few shots of two but the second one was pretty distant and the third was in a “none shall pass” area. Luckily the first one posed very nicely just on the edge of the allotments otherwise I might not have a had a single butterfly shot to post on a PD on a Butterfly website
Even the Pacific Garden was quiet with just 2 Marbled Whites and a Meadow Brown constantly moving and stopping for only the briefest of sips of nectar. It was pretty infuriating as I’d watch the butterfly for what felt like an age, it would land and by the time I’d stalked a few paces towards it it would have finished drinking and off we would go again in the same fashion ad infinitum!
For once the Japanese garden was actually open and so we all Zened out and took in the Cheery trees, raked gravel and miniature tea house. Of particular interest was the pond as every now and again a Newt would come up for air and so cropping like mad I was able to get a few record shots which I will try and use on one of those cold, dark winter evenings to make an identification (I’m not up to speed on my Herp IDs).
Finally just as we were leaving I managed my second Butterfly shots of the day with a Meadow Brown hunkered down expecting rain at any moment!
Pretty disappointing again (this is my second visit this year) from what used to be a cracking little site due to the vagaries of the weather
![Sad :(](./images/smilies/icon_sad.gif)
. Are we ever going to get some perfect weekend butterflying weather?
Have a goodun
Wurzel