www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

Great roundups Bugboy with a cracking selection of species

Cheers,

Neil.

Thanks Trevor, yes Swallowtails . Bookham seems to have had a good run with Purple Hairstreaks, three years in a row now and long may that last .
Thanks Goldie, it was indeed a very memorable day. If you can make it again I highly recommend it
Thanks Wurzel, it's about time you took the plunge and did an east coast trip, how many years brownie points would that need in the bank?
Thanks David, not sure if I'm gonna make it to the continent next year but I have a few UK trip in the pipeline, fingers crossed
Thanks Neil, Here's the final selection

2019 highlights (part 4)
Although the last 3 species of the year were added to my tally in August, the butterfly season in general seemed to be winding down rapidly. With the moving forward of the season and traditionally high summer species all but ending by the end of July, August felt rather bereft of butterflies, but there was the prospect of Brown Hairstreaks in the coming weeks plus the possibility of something even more exciting the finish the season off with a nice blue flourish!

I’d managed to catch up with some early male Grayling in mid-July but a trip to Chobham at the beginning of August gave me the much sought after upperside shots when I found a courting pair. Earlier that day I’d also had a mothy highlight with a very amenable Jersey Tiger Moth giving me some more unusual views of this stunning moth. Elsewhere many of the species I’d been chasing just a few weeks previously were fast vanishing. The likes of the golden Skippers and Gatekeepers dwindling fast, and others that I would normally expect to see in decent numbers like the Common Blue, Speckled Wood and Small Copper were still struggling like they had been all season. Even the second brood Adonis weren’t as numerous as in previous years. As seems to be the norm though, the Large Skipper was still to be found on Chobham Common in the middle of the month. However, one thing I’d missed out so far was the Painted Lady invasion which seemed to have bypassed the southeast corner of the country. My best encounter was down in Southwick in the second half of August where I found around 15 gorging themselves on Buddleja. On the same day I also found my first (UK) Cloudie of the year. I’d left finding the Lulworth Skipper very late this year, too late as a trip to Dorset at the end of the month would show me, another ‘victim’ of the changing butterfly season, but on the first day of the trip I took a detour via Shipton Bellinger to try and find the even more elusive than normal Brown Hairstreak. Luckily some extra pairs of eyes in the form of Wurzel and Philzoid helped make the stop over well worth it and it became the best part of what was otherwise a rather lacklustre trip. An encounter with a Small Tortoiseshell is fast becoming a highlight of any year these days so finding several feeding together at Alners Gorze did provide some consolation. My last species of butterfly for the year (no. 50) turned up a few day later and will of course come as no surprise to anyone that it was a big highlight. My first ever Long-tailed Blue. He may have been a rather tatty individual but that didn’t matter a jot. A month later I was adding to my catalogue of LTB images with some proper fresh home-grown insects before the weather put a premature end to what was shaping up to be a real explosion. The final part of the season was spent picking my way through a mixed bag of dodgy weather. Red Admirals came into their own, another very special encounter with a freshly minted LTB, some more Brown Hairstreak and a Wall at a new site for me, Two Tree Island. The 22nd of October seems like a long time ago but was my last encounter with butterflies this year. Now it’s already nearly the new year and the countdown for the new season is almost upon us, I wonder what 2020 has in store for us all

Cracking stuff in the Highlights Part 4 Bugboy The Brostreaks certainly did make us work for the shots this year - hopefully next year they'll be in a a more sociable mood. Good to see the West is still producing the goods when it comes to Small Torts - fingers crossed it continues As for the Tiger Moth - they are so bright they don;t look real - it's like a child with a paint-set was let loose on them - that underside
As for the East Coast trip - at the current Brownie point rate I might be able to make it by about 2030

Have a goodun - and a Merry Christmas and New Year if I don't get to say before

Wurzel

bugboy wrote: ↑Fri Dec 20, 2019 8:57 pm...Although the last 3 species of the year were added to my tally in August, the butterfly season in general seemed to be winding down rapidly. With the moving forward of the season and traditionally high summer species all but ending by the end of July, August felt rather bereft of butterflies, but there was the prospect of Brown Hairstreaks in the coming weeks plus the possibility of something even more exciting the finish the season off with a nice blue flourish!

That's a sentiment I'm totally in agreement with, BB.

It seems like the butterfly season consistently loses momentum during August these last few years, and I suppose if spring is getting progressivey earlier then something has to give at the latter end of the season too.

Thank God for Brown Hairstreaks, as in the absence (in Wales) of Adonis Blue and Silver Spotted Skipper, this is one of the few rarities that emerges fresh during this increasingly autumnal month.

Sounds like you need to start work on the east wing of the Wurzel mansion to get those brownie points accrued
With the way things are going I can see August becoming busier in the decades to come David, with traditionally univoltine species trying to cram in second broods, although they will probably fall into the same trap the Wall fell into to start with

December 2019.

As you may expect given the recent weather, I’ve not been out much with the camera and when I have been out there’s not been a great deal to point my camera at, certainly not much in the way of winter birdy visitors.

On the 11th I took a wander round the Lea Valley up near Cheshunt again, Finches and Tits could be heard high in the canopy, far out of reach (and for the most part out of sight) so I was left with a few water birds, a rather chubby looking, sunbathing Squirrel and an inquisitive (and seasonally appropriate) Robin. On the 15th it was off to Two Tree Island. Rubbish Sunday trains meant I didn’t arrive until well past midday so I only had a few hours before the sun was gone. Although it was a high tide (very high at 6 meters) the waders weren’t flocking in the lagoon, perhaps the very high tide had pushed them further up the estuary? I did Manage a Reed Bunting and few Curlew were sitting it out on the few bits of salt marsh greenery still above water level. I caught an Egret doing some ballet moves to an unimpressed audience of one I stayed local on the 18th with a wander on Walthamstow Marshes. A few Meadow Pipits were mixed in with the regular Wagtails. A sizable flock of Chaffinch contained no Brambling and there was still no sign of the winter Thrushes which would normally be seen on the horse paddocks here. The resident Linnets were hanging around though, a passing Canada Goose gave me a quizzical look and there was another chubby, sunbathing Squirrel. The smaller woodland birds were more obliging today, there was an acrobatic Blue Tit and a great Tit posed briefly in a shaft of sunlight. This Herring Gull didn’t seem very impressed about having its picture taken though !

Cheers Bugboy I think perhaps not finishing the first phase of the renovation work is what's holding me back with the accruing of Brownie points Cracking set of bird shots - you did especially well with the shot of the Meadow Pipit as usually they find the only tuft of longer grass to sit behind

Have a goodun and a cracking New Year in case I don't get to wish it later

Wurzel

Thanks Wurzel, That was the only pic of the Pipit I took where he wasn't mostly concealed. He did howevere pose much better next time I saw him...

29th December.
My final outing of the year, prompted by a rare sunny day. Once again it was a rather barren day on the bird front with not a great deal about other than the regulars on the horse paddocks. Just Wagtails, Feral Pigeons, Starlings, Linnets and Chaffinches. Moving onto the Waterworks Nature Reserve things livened up a bit. Teal had finally turned up here but could be heard rather than seen. Coots were causing trouble, sqabbling and fighting amongst the other waterfowl which included Mallard, Gadwall and Little Grebe/Dabchick. It was amongst the other waterfowl I found my best birdy spot of the day, a couple of female Scaup, It’s been several years since I’ve seen these winter visitors that normally stay near the coast. A pair of Swans were also having a good old bathing session. My favourite shot in the serious (I just pointed and left my finger on the shutter button) is this one, perfect for a caption competition. On the return walk I caught up with a Meadow Pipit (probably the same one as last time) who posed like a star this time. Here’s hoping we get a nice cold snap in the coming months to set us up for a good productive 2020, Happy New Year everyone .

I bloody love baths too Bugboy but not as much as that Swan Have a great New Year

Have a goodun

Wurzel

bugboy wrote: ↑Tue Dec 31, 2019 6:01 pmHere’s hoping we get a nice cold snap in the coming months to set us up for a good productive 2020..

Happy New Year to you too, BB, and yes, I concur 100% with your wishes for a cold snap. Around 10 days towards the end of January would be perfect, thank you.

Thanks for the comments guys

January 2020.
It may be mild but still no butterflies seen since my last outing. Although I’ve seen a few reports of Red Admirals and Peacocks at nearby Epping Forest, that’s not been one of my destinations recently. I’d booked a few days off which helpfully coincided with a reasonable break in wet weather, at least during the day anyway.
On the 9th I ventured down to the Wetland Centre at Barnes, south London. There was no sign of any Bittern today and the sightings board said only one had been seen in recent days. The Wigeon were looking rather smart in the sun. These two Egyptian Geese provided a handy point of reference when pointing out the only Snipe I saw to other birders. Gulls were everywhere with first winter Herrings outnumbering all others, here’s two Common Gull closest to the camera (not Britain's commonest Gull), two Black-headed Gull with the red beaks (in there non breeding plumage and lacking the dark brown, not black, breeding plumage heads) and a Lesser Black-back Gull (with it's dark grey back).... common names eh A few Cormorants were sat around, drying off after a hard mornings fishing but one Crow was being a right little s*&%! There were several around but only this one was causing trouble, persistently creeping up behind them and pecking at them. I’m not entirely sure what the Crow was getting out of it but he was clearly being a right pain in the butt! Other noteworthy inhabitants today were some Shelduck and a pair of Pintail, the drake looking particularly splendid. On the 10th it was off to Bookham for the first visit of the new decade. I didn’t come away with a great deal of pictures. The first thing I did was egg hunting, quickly finding eight Brown Hairstreak along a short stretch of hedgerow. Banks Common still seems to be empty of lifestock despite the new fence line and large pond being over a year old now, but I did disturb the first Redwings I’ve seen this winter there. Being in the countryside they proved near impossible to approach (the ones that turn up on my local patch are far more approachable), not helped by the ever-present Blackbird shouting my presence from the safety of every bush I tried to sneak past. A quick check on my White Admiral larvae had mixed results. Pete was taking thing esay, still safely tucked up, much like his namesake would have preferred to have been in recent weeks no doubt ! Bad news awaited me further on though, Dave and his hibernaculum were nowhere to be seen

After that is was more a case of just enjoying the afternoon, precious little sat still long enough to point my camera at. Some more egg hunting gave me a final total of just twelve Brown Hairstreaks and no Purples.
Quite a bit more scrub clearance has been going on again this winter, and also, they’ve been cutting down Turkey Oak which will create a few new clearings in the wood. It’ll be interesting to see what effects these will have in the coming months.

I also took a few shots of the Moon in the evening, think I managed to capture the penumbral eclipse with this Gif. The 3 photos used to make it were taken at 19:06, 19:18 and 20:29

Lovely set of shots Bugboy - I really need to get out but accruing Brownie points and looking after the recovering cat is taking it's toll so seeing your shots is a great boost . I've never understood how we've managed to get the 'common' naming of gulls so wrong? Perhaps the non distinct appearance of Mew/Common Gull is how it got it's name - as it was just a 'common or garden' gull? I prefer 'chocolate headed gull for BHGull when it's in summer plummage

Have a goodun

Wurzel

I agree with Wurzel. The true black-headed gull is the Mediterranean gull, with a truly black head in the breeding season.

Always nice to see your avian presentations during the winter, BB, not to mention the early stage butterflies. Well done too with your lunar image....something I absolutely must try myself when the next opportunity presents itself.

Great Bird shots Bugboy, You've made me want to get my camera and get out there Goldie

Thanks Wurzel, glad I can help whilst your accruing your brownie points, hope the cat is ok. Yes Chocolate Headed Gull is a far more accurate name! As Essex says there's plenty of dark headed Gulls with genuinely black heads out there
Thanks David, more birdies below
Thanks Goldie, you're not doing to bad with your garden birds yourself

January 2020.
On the 12th I went over to Two Tree Island in Essex. If it wasn’t for the strong wind it may have been sunny enough to get a butterfly sighting, as it was, it was strictly a birdie day out.
Since the hides were destroyed by vandals over a year ago, wader watching on the sheltered lagoon hasn’t been nearly as good as it once was. Today there were some flocks but they were staying on the far islands and seemed very fidgety. As far as I could tell they were mostly Knot with a sprinkling of Dunlin. On another island Redshank ruled the roost, whilst dotted here and there others were found including Curlew, Oystercatcher and Grey Plover. Avocet were nowhere to be seen. After watching them for around half an hour a female Sparrowhawk came through low down, on a hunting sortie and put everything up. She didn’t catch anything but there was much murmurating before pretty much everything vanished across the Hadleigh Ray channel towards Canvey Island putting an end to any real birdwatching in this corner of the island. Along the southern edge of the Island Curlew were as usual sitting out high tide on the bits of saltmarsh vegatation still visible and I put up a small flock of Snipe who were to fast to get any pictures of. At the other end of the Island the high tide had brought the large flocks of Brent Geese close to the shore as the fed in the ‘shallows’. I once again spent some time trying to get some shots of the very flighty and shy Kingfisher, failing again so I did one more circuit of the Island before I lost the light. On the Lagoon a small group of Wigeon had turned up but with the tide now on it’s way out little else was there apart from a trio of Ringed Plover And in the dying embers of the day I found a pair of Shelduck Today (the 15th) a predicted sunny afternoon tempted me out locally for a couple of hours in Epping Forest. The recent rains had created much flooding with many of the ditches and brooks that become The Ching, (hence nearby Chingford) overflowing onto the paths and made me question my choice of footwear for the day, wellies would have made life much easier.

The weather also made me question (as is so often the case) my reliance on the forcasts. Despite my phone apps dogged insistence that there was just be harmless fluffy clouds around I got drenched and bombarded from the heavens I left rather damp with just a handful of pictures of a Jay 1/24th of the way through the year already, where does the time go

Hi Bugboy, just catching up on your recent posts, a cracking selection of birds there and some great photos of them

Cheers,

Neil.

Thanks Neil, they do help fill the butterflyless void which is potentially only another 6 weeks long... at least down here anyway

January 2020.
20th, a little break from UK wildlife. Here's a selection of tropical butterflies from London Zoos Butterfly Paradise exhibit. Since it’s the depths of winter and the ‘off’ season there wasn’t a great deal around but enough to point a camera at. Sadly it was a bit overcast at the time so light levels were basically useless and many of the butterflies were roosting. It also meant I had to use flash with mixed results.
A single Leopard Lacewing Cethosia cyane. Next to it, and largely overlooked by everyone else here, was this butterfly which looked like a cross between a Red Admiral and a Nettle tree Butterfly…. more of it later. A couple of Malachite Sipreota stelenes, one showing it’s close relationship to Heliconids, feeding on a dish of pollen. Some of their larvae were also on show which I’ve never seen before. They’re quite magnificent creatures but my pictures didn’t really come out particularly well. Next up a couple of tropical butterfly house staples, a Zebra Heliconid Heliconius charitonius and a Glasswing Greta oto, the flash giving the Glasswing some eye catching refracting iridescence. Another less commonly encountered Heliconid is Heliconius sara. The inner half of the wings, up to the pale-yellow bands, is iridescent blue but in this case, the flash ruined it no matter from what angle I tried to photograph it from. There were a few of that other staple Heliconid, The Postman Heliconius Melpomene but the final one of this group I managed was the Tiger Longwing Heliconius hecale. Back to that camouflaged roosting one that looked a bit like a Red Admiral, here’s it’s upperside A Mexican Bluewing Myscelia ethusa

A cracking collection of bird shots and then exotics Bugboy - and some of those are tricky ones to separate out/identify. I had a go a few years back and ended up getting very enjoyably lost in the wonders of Batesian and Mullerian mimicry rings

Have a goodun

Wurzel

Thanks Wurzel. Aaaahh mimicry rings, fascinating evolution

January 2020.
Wednesday the 29th turned out to be a nice sunny day and tempted me out for a local jaunt again. Still no butterflies for yours truly but then I’m not really expecting any for a while yet unless we get a silly warm spell like last year. Anyway I took the short train ride up to Cheshunt to wander around the lakes and woodland of the Lea Valley up there. Once again there was not much in the way of winter avian visitors but there was plenty of interesting things going on. (They just mentioned the lack of winter migrant birds on WinterWatch as I write this!)

Here's a small portion of a larger group of Tufted Duck, all Drakes The Great-crested Grebe are starting to colour up now and I caught a pair practising the elaborate courtship ritual, just a short preliminary round before the breeding starts in a few weeks’ time. A quick flap to loosen up after. Coots were causing trouble as usual, here’s a group thinking about reeking havoc! A few Heron were about and I was watching this one pick around in the turf and mud. It was only when I looked at the image on my computer that I saw it was eating worms. Pick of the day though goes to a little Long-tailed Tit who completely ignored me as it foraged down in the grass by the side of the path .

Great bird shot Bugboy The Long-tailed Tit is great - always value for money they are! I was in the New Forest after Christmas and saw some good stuff including a Firecrest and a small party of Crossbills but the highlight was actually a family of LT Tits The Tufties were brilliantly captured - you can see the fabulous sheen on their heads

Have a goodun

Wurzel