Padfield

[Cotswold Cockney]

Nice break for your folks Guy ...

Murials ...

The Swiss take their Railways very seriously. Quite right too, unlike some Nations I could mention.

There again, what do I know. My heros were and still are those magnificent engineers: Isambard Kingdom Brunel and George Stephenson.

[Padfield]

The Swiss do take their railways seriously, CC - and the system works! For the equivalent of about £2500 a year, I have unlimited use of all the trains and buses in the country. Absolutely no need to have a car (and I don't drive anyway).

My parents arrived to a heatwave. In French, a heatwave is 'la canicule' - the little dog. The word has the same fanciful origins as the English expression 'dog days', alluding to the idea that in high summer Sirius (the dog star) rises in the day and adds its brilliance to the sun's.

Whatever the cause, there was not a cloud in the sky all day and the temperatures soared.





In the evening, Leo chased Venus and Jupiter to the horizon. Venus is the lower planet in this picture:



Tomorrow they will be even closer, as Venus passes beneath Jupiter, from bottom right to top left.

The moon was not quite full tonight:



Guy

[Cotswold Cockney]

We have near identical weather conditions here in the UK today Guy. Hottest day of the year by far today and not a cloud in the Sky in any direction as far as the eye can see in Gloucestershire.

Our resident garden Robin was twice seen spread eagle style with wings extended flat on my newly mown Lawn today. Sunning itself or allowing ants access under the feathers. :dunno: Had an explosion of queen ants into the kitchen in today's heat. Where are all those Anting Seagulls when you need them...

That reminds me, on two recent visits to the Council Waste Disposal facility in Hempstead Gloucester, one today. No Seagulls to be seen where previous visits would see thousands over the landfill areas. A few hundred crows on the newly moved top soil covering no doubt after various living items disturbed in the earth moving for food. I noticed the near total lack of Gulls two weeks ago on a previous visit and also a very active Buzzard which are frequent in the area. Only this Buzzard was not, it was a Harris Hawk when I had a better view of the very active bird.

After disposing of much "green waste" there ( having a good tidy up in our overgrown garden ) I heard what I thought was a bird scarer going off at intervals or it may have been a small bore shot gun. Speaking to one of the Council operatives who were also watching the Hawk, they explained that that part of the disposal process is not under Council care but has been privatised. That company have employed a Falconer with his Harris Hawk as a deterrent for the once many thousands of resident Gulls over the landfill incessantly. Seems to be working close to 100% effectiveness.

Saw a bird on today's visit which still has me puzzled. A small very dark Falcon which passed low over my car as I arrived. First thought was a Hobby which are frequently seen summer visitors to Gloucestershire ~ I'm a keen member of the Gloucestershire Raptor Monitoring Group ~ but my sighting today really has me guessing... but, Hobbys are larger, much larger than the bird I saw today. Yet another Natural History additional unidentified sighting in my life long love of observing nature which will remain a mystery.

despite the heat, even in the City Centre I spotted a tatty Speckled Wood on the wing. Plenty of Small Tortoiseshells about including a few sunning themselves on my patio earlier today. Later it became too hot and few insects were on the wing.

[Pete Eeles]

In French, a heatwave is 'la canicule' - the little dog. The word has the same fanciful origins as the English expression 'dog days', alluding to the idea that in high summer Sirius (the dog star) rises in the day and adds its brilliance to the sun's.

I learn something every day, Guy, and often from you

Cheers,

- Pete

[Padfield]

I learn something every day, Guy, and often from you

Like all UK Butterfliers, I've learnt an immeasurable amount from you, Pete!

CC - yes, the extreme heat does seem to change behaviour. Today I watched a male large white, normally a heat-seeking butterfly, retiring to deep shade in the woods. By its behaviour I first thought it was a female brimstone and my curiosity was aroused - it seemed to be looking for a place to lay but brimstones shouldn't be laying at this time of year. Then I realised - just a canicule-weary large white.

An indirect effect of the heat has been that I have not been able to monitor the purple emperors. Normally when my parents come out I have the early morning to myself and take them up the mountain in the afternoon. This year I have had to get them up and out in the cool of the morning because the afternoons are intolerable for octagenarians - even fit ones! Every day the temperature has soared rapidly to over 30°C, usually peaking somewhere between 35°C and 37°C. At 22h00 last night it was 31°C in my living room ... Even up the mountain I have been looking after my parents, so no piccies of butterflies to show. But here are a few iPhone piccies of life in Switzerland ...


Mum and Minnie with la Dent de Favre in the background


Grand Chamossaire - 2200m


Almost cloudless skies


My family and other animals ... I'm the one on the left (Lawrence of Erebia)


And a bit of culture. Matisse and Picasso at La Fondation Giannada at Martigny. For anyone visiting the Rhône Valley, the Fondation is a must-see. Every year there is a different exhibition, amassing an astonishing collection of paintings on the theme of a chosen artist. This year it was Matisse. In previous years we have enjoyed Monet, Van Gogh, les Fauvistes and others. Always worth a visit.

Guy

[Padfield]

My parents left with the canicule. Extraordinary - they were here for ten days, exactly coinciding with the most intense heatwave in Switzerland since records began.

This morning I went to my cardinal site to see if they had returned (the cardinals, not my parents). They hadn't, but the trip was far from a waste of time. White admirals were gliding up and down the road and in a nearby quarry purple emperors were taking minerals from the lime. The first I found was a bit tatty and was scuttling around restlessly:



The next was in fine condition, and much more amenable too:



We enjoyed each other's company:



I passed a couple of hours in that region, finding no cardinals at all, and so decided to head east along the valley to play catch-up on all the things I've missed out on in the last couple of weeks. One of these was rock grayling and I spent a little time trying to get good photos of that:



This is not a brilliant picture but note the joyous wood white in the background:



In this shot it is the rock grayling that is jumping for joy:



These are the taxon Lafranchis calls genava, which others subsume under the name hermione.



Great sooty satyrs are now out ...



... as are the high summer blues, like these Escher's blue, Meleager's blue and Damon blue:







Apollos are single-brooded but fly from spring to autumn:



I was almost too late for the ilex hairstreaks, seeing just two of them, both in poor condition. This one was taking minerals:



They hadn't begun last time I visited this site, on 7th June. In contrast, the southern white admirals were there then and now:





This is the first shot of (eastern) Bath white I've managed to get all year:



This beautiful wood white had something wrong with it, I think, as it continually basked with its wings open. I fear it had been hit by a cyclist or car:





Altogether I saw over 50 species today, without any real effort. These were:

Scarce swallowtail, swallowtail, Apollo, Large white, small white, southern small white, green-veined white, eastern Bath white, wood white, black-veined white, clouded yellow, Berger's clouded yellow, brimstone, ilex hairstreak, northern brown argus, common blue, Eros blue, Provençal short-tailed blue, idas blue, holly blue, little blue, chalkhill blue, Escher's blue, Meleager's blue, Damon blue, chequered blue, silver-washed fritillary, Queen of Spain fritilary, heath fritillary, Provençal fritillary, knapweed fritillary, marbled fritillary, high brown fritillary, large tortoiseshell, small tortoiseshell, red admiral, painted lady, white admiral, southern white admiral, purple emperor, grayling, rock grayling, great sooty satyr, meadow brown, small heath, large skipper, small skipper, Essex skipper, grizzled skipper, large grizzled skipper, dingy skipper, marbled skipper, mallow skipper.

Summer is here!

Guy

[bugboy]

Wow, wow and ummmm WOW! thats a pretty fine tally for one day!!!

[David M]

Excellent reportage, Guy. Yes, the easternmost parts of France have been hardest hit by this 'canicule' which I suppose has implications for la Suisse.

[Padfield]

Thanks Buggy. 50+ is a good day but places like the Alps, Provence or Greece, which have exceptionally high species densities, it is not out of the ordinary. I used to chase numbers but don't any more, preferring to focus on getting to know species.

I see you were enjoying the heat too, David! It has certainly accelerated the season.

Today's featured creature is Thor's fritillary, Boloria thore. Two years ago, on 8th July, I found a nice little patch for these in the Kandersteg region. I didn't go back last year and would have liked to go earlier this year but couldn't. So today it was. I arrived on site at about 10h00 am, expecting just to get off the bike and start photographing them - but nothing. Titania's fritillaries, false heath fritillaries and pearl-bordered were all flying but no Thor's. Then, at about 10h30, I finally spotted a male, lurking deep in the shadows, just beyond the limits I had found them two years ago:







Shortly afterwards I saw a second, which I initially took to be a female because of the larger size and paler appearance in flight, but later became less sure about. I only saw the underside at rest, and that only briefly:



After this I took a long walk with Minnie, checking out many other seemingly likely places and climbing some 400m or so higher up the mountain, along the river. No more thore. There were very many false heath frits, which always caught my eye because of their dusky colouring - and the larger, worn males were quite deceptive - but definitely no thore.

Returning to my original site I found a further two males. The first was again creeping around in the shadows. Like graylings, this species has a habit of resting with the plane of the wings angled into the sun, meaning neither side is really good to photograph. I resorted to flash (as I did in the picture above) to get the full pattern of the underwings, though this does distort the true appearance somewhat.

Here is this male taken without flash, the wings casting shadows onto themselves:



And here is the same insect with flash. The wing is flattened, like the full moon, but the subtle patterns are easier to see:



The last one I saw was, amazingly, nectaring in full sun and I had a brilliant chance to get the definitive thore shot. Unfortunately, I didn't notice that the vegetation behind it (and me) was six feet tall and growing out of a pit. I thought it was two feet tall and growing on level ground. I stepped back to reposition myself without my shadow falling on the butterfly and fell straight into the pit. Minnie laughed and the Thore's frit flew off. Tant pis! That's what tomorrows are for.

Guy

[MikeOxon]

The classic photographer's 'pitfall', when eyes are glued to the viewfinder! I trust no serious injury.

[Padfield]

Thanks Mike - no, I fell gracefully and without injury!

I forgot to mention that Thor's fritillary has a two-year life cycle, so the butterflies I saw today would have been the offspring, or nephews and nieces, of the ones I saw two years ago. It will be interesting to go next year and see if they fly in exactly the same place. It is quite possible that in odd and even years the population numbers and centres are different.

Guy

PS - I also forgot to mention, Yay, Roger!! I was a little torn between him and Murray but in the end the Swiss outclassed the Brit. With the marvels of modern technology I could watch the match on my iPad on the train coming home.

[Padfield]

For the umpteenth successive day I was up at 06h00 this morning. Today it was for Erebia christi. For those who don't know this butterfly, it is the ultimate trophy. It is known from no more than 4 Swiss sites, all of which are vertiginous alpine slopes where staying alive is the number one priority. There is one well known Italian site where it is much more accessible but I have never been there - it is accessible to drivers, not to cyclists! With just a handful of colonies, all within a stone's throw of the Simplon Pass, it is certainly one of the rarest European butterflies and the sheer difficulty of reaching it adds to its cachet. Today, Matt Rowlings gave me a lift and joined me for the hunt - at the Swiss site where I photographed a male and a female two years ago.

This is the terrain:



Minnie couldn't climb up there, so I had to carry her all the way. Then, at the end, I had to carry her down again. Between times, she did very gingerly make her own way around, often following me, but this was not Jack Russell terrain.





Did we find christi?

Matt and I split up, to different ends of the site - and without any communication as his (Orange) phone had no signal. I rang him on my (Swisscom) phone and he got the voicemail message while we were having a drink afterwards. But in short, I caught and photographed one confirmed christi. He thought he had one but after reviewing the pictures in the field we both inclined towards epiphron. I might have seen up to three more in flight, without any possibility of reaching them, but given that I, too, later netted an epiphron believing it to be christi, the only reliable record is the one I photographed.

The real christi (a male):







Not brilliant pictures - but after that last one, without posing with wings open, he took off and was never seen again.

For comparison, here is the (female) epiphron I caught in error:





I think we were too late. This used to be the optimum date but times have changed and it now flies earlier - so the very end of June is probably now the best time.

We stayed up the hill a long time but did stop off at a couple of sites on the way home, for a few minutes at each, seeing rebeli, trappi and escheri, as well as loads of rock graylings.

rebeli


trappi


escheri


Guy

[Goldie M]

Catching up on your posts, what fantastic beautiful photos, Goldie

[Padfield]

Thank you Goldie - I really appreciate your comments.

I took it easy today, feeling very tire after so much heat and activity. Of course, I took Minnie for a walk to the woods and kept an eye open for white-letter hairstreaks. These have been increasingly scarce in recent years, with the cutting down of a lot of elms by the woodmen and the death by disease of the large, flowering elm which formed the centre of the colony. I looked up into the canopy in vain for the familiar sight of butterflies flitting around and sparring above the upper leaves. But on my way back home I did spot a single female, feeding up avidly:





Guy

[Padfield]

I had a very pleasant day today in Italy with UK Butterflies member Paul Kipling, aka Reverdin. From the butterfly point of view it didn't go entirely to plan, but some of the unplanned bits were very good anyway. I had hoped to show him large chequered skipper at a site where I found them commonly last year but it seemed the heatwave had finished them off for the season. We saw just one, which didn't stop. Paul was very pleased with the chequered blues at the same site, though. Here he is, photographing one:



There were also plenty of purple-shot coppers at the site:



Another target had been Hungarian glider, which I saw earlier this year, but we didn't even bother going up to that site as it seemed clear they would be over too. Instead, Paul was keen to check out an Italian christi site. As I mentioned in a previous post, there is one well known site that is relatively more accessible than the Swiss sites, so we headed off there, after first popping into a second lowland site. There, among other species, several short-tailed blues were flying. This one had particularly impressive orange lunulation, being more reminiscent of Plebejus at rest than Cupido, though instantly recognisable as a short-tailed blue in flight.



An hour later we were trekking up to the christi site. This is Minnie, exhorting Paul to hurry up.



They even have the nerve to advertise the butterfly's presence on the mountain:





Sadly, but not surprisingly (given that it was nearly over at altitude a couple of days ago, and this is a lower site), that was the closest Paul got to christi on this trip. But we did enjoy marbled ringlets, Erebia montana, on the way up, a lifer for Paul:





Erebia melampus was quite numerous, this one taking a shine to my patent non-leather walking boots:





Other Erebia species flying were euryale, pharte, epiphron and medusa. The first silver-spotted skippers of the season were flying.

This is a male purple-edged copper of the subspecies eurydame, lacking any violet reflections:



By this time it was getting late and I had a long journey home, so we headed down the mountain.

Thanks, Paul, for a great day, and for all the beer you bought me!

Guy

[bugboy]

That last Copper is exquisite!

[Wurzel]

Great reporting and shots Guy But I'm secretly kinda glad that we don't have masses of 'Erebia' in the UK as they look like a right bu$$er to ID

Have a goodun

Wurzel

[Padfield]

Thanks Buggy - I'm a great fan of coppers.

Erebia aren't so bad when you get used to them, Wurzel. It's quite rare nowadays for me to see one I can't place immediately, but it does happen ...

Minnie and I were up at 05h00 this morning to get up a high Valais mountain town by about 08h30. There, we climbed up to well over 2600m, into the snow, and had a tremendous day. I took 339 photos, which I know is nothing for some of you (especially those with burst mode) but it's a lot for me and I've spent the last nearly three hours processing them all. So, this will mostly be a pictorial post - too tired for many words!!

The main mission was to photograph male Boloria sp. - specifically, napaea and pales. That I did, but will reserve my conclusions for another post. Here are some pictures of other stuff - with just a few Boloria thrown in ...

Roughly in order of increasing altitude, here are a few Erebia:


(melampus)


(mnestra)


(pharte)


(gorge)


(pandrose)

There were lots of tyndarus at the lower altitudes but I didn't photograph any. Epiphron was also flying.

This pool looks peaceful enough ...



Appearances can be deceptive.

I went to its muddy edges to look for puddling butterflies and noticed that the surface was covered in petals, like a Japanese wedding. Then suddenly I realised they weren't petals but dead butterflies and moths - hundreds and hundreds of them. This is a little blue and what I took to be a bleached Psodos quadrifaria - but I might have to look that one up.



Stop reading now if you are of a sensitive disposition. Here are more tiny tragedies:

There were dozens of pandrose:





When I photographed it I thought this was gorge but I'm not so sure now:



I haven't decided on this one:



I think this is napaea:



This one, that I took out, is definitely napaea:



Surface tension is no respecter of celebrity. This is Cynthia's fritillary:



Of course, I saved as many as I could, using my net as a fishing net, in the lepster equivalent of swords into ploughshares. But the only ones I got out living and undamaged were burnet moths and a couple of little blues.

By the side of l'étang de la mort, living butterflies supped happily, like bathers on a shark beach:


(alpine grayling)


(Erebia gorge)


(female Cynthia's frit)


(idas blue)

Too many words still! I'm knackered and need to go to bed! So just some more pictures now.










(alpine heath, Coenonympha gardetta)


(glandon blue)


(Cynthia's fritillary)


(young wheatear on a mountain chalet)


(another wheatear)


(probably pales, covered in Acarians)

That's all for now! Lots of Boloria to come ...

Guy

[David M]

What a day you had, Guy!

I shall look forward to the next instalment.

It's strange how so many butterflies drown in these kinds of ponds. Good that you tried to rescue some, even though I suspect it was usually to no avail.

[Chris Jackson]

Excellent photos of butterflies and scenery, Guy. Well done for saving those souls you were able to.
I bet the air is more breathable where you are than here in the stifling heat of the Cote d'Azur with its seasonal human over-population.
Chris