Thanks
Wurzel, just amount made it out (see below). That's a lot of Geese! It would be nice for it to be a Spotted Redshank, would have been a lifer for me, but thanks for trying
November 2020
Wednesday 4th. I’m old enough to remember a time when if you wanted to see a butterfly in the UK in November, you either went to a butterfly house or went rooting around in the darker recesses of the garden shed. These days it’s almost standard you’ll find something on the wing if you know where to look: adult hibernators squeezing in a few extra weeks nectaring, Red Admirals and Clouded Yellows hanging around far longer than they used to and others squeezing in an extra brood. This year, in that respect was no different. There was however the rather dark cloud of lockdown 2.0 looming ever closer and my local patches had all but given up producing butterflies weeks ago. The day before lockdown started was however a happy coincidence in being my day off from work and the sunniest day of the week, so it was of for one final day down to the south coast.
Mill Hill was the main destination but as I usually do at this time of year, I stopped off at Southwick harbour first, quickly finding a Clouded Yellow. He stopped pretty regularly, it is November after all, but the main problem in getting close without disturbing him was the long November shadows.
After chasing him up and down the slope (he wasn’t going anywhere it seemed) I moved on along the path and noticed something silvery low down in the hedge. Not a species I was expecting to see, a female Holly Blue, the first I've ever seen here. Despite the wing damage she looked freshly emerged too
![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_smile.gif)
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She fluttered off out of sight high up into the hedge when I tried to do a bit of gardening around her so I trundled on, a Grey Wagtail distracted me for a while, foraging along the litter strewn strandline
![Confused :?](./images/smilies/icon_confused.gif)
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Another Cloudie made a brief appearance without stopping (I’m presuming it was a different one since the first one had shown no sign of wanting to leave the grassy slope at the centre of the site) and after he vanished I spied some movement on some Ivy blossom at the top of the slope. The Red Admiral wasn’t showing any sign of coming down to say hello though.
I wandered back and forth a few more times, noting a few more Holly Blues who stayed frustratingly out of reach of the macro lens
Whilst the original Cloudie was still flying back and forth, now also being chased by Dave Cook.
Together we went back to the Holly Blues and (including the original female I’d seen at the start) came to a minimum total of seven, although there was little doubt the real total was significantly higher. The best spot was of a mating pair, the first time I’ve seen Holly Blues in cop.
A bit further along a second Red Admiral came down and settled at our feet.
After all this, Mill Hill was almost an afterthought and when I finally got round to going there I was glad Southwick had came up trumps, an hours walk on the ‘main site’ gave me just a single solitary female Common Blue, somewhat past here sell by date!
Still, four species in November is never to be sniffed at
![Very Happy :D](./images/smilies/icon_biggrin.gif)
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