www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

Hope you keep tabs on Aurelian and you do get that video this time
Are your plague of RA just moving through, still heading south...or do you think these will stay local to you now?
Love the shots with those mountains in the background....
N

I saw all the posts about red admirals heading south in the UK but it's not something I've observed here. I've only ever seen them behaving territorially in autumn, not moving in any particular direction (they usually rode large circuits), or simply feeding (many of those I've shown recently are females).

I hope the mugshots I took of 7 individuals on October 12th will shed some light on this. If any of those pop up again in January of February it will show that at least some settled here.

Red admirals are distinctly commoner at altitude at the moment. There were lots zooming around Villars (1250m) the other day - but they haven't been a strong feature at rotting fruit in the valley (though there are some in the valley).

As for Aurelian - we are not thinking about that video yet! He has yet to survive the winter - five months of bitter cold, marauding tits, abrasive deer, little boys running around with sticks and forestry commission clean-ups.

Guy

Aurelian hasn't moved a whisker since Wednesday. So that's him for the winter - he's clearly sunk into his final hibernative state and won't be roaming that sallow bush again until April at the earliest.

I reckon he's found a pretty good place: right next to an awkward fork, so birds won't be perching on his twig (it's quite a thin twig anyway, some distance from any stable branches) and right over a joint, where he looks very similar to the leaf buds further out along the spray.



So, assuming all goes well, my next update on him will be in 2012 (unless I get any spectacular frosty/icy/snowy pictures of him when winter falls)!!

Guy

I wasn't going to post any more pictures of Aurelian for a while, but I thought it interesting to note that he seems still to be changing colour.



Pictures I've found on the web show a variety of colours of hibernating iris cats, and they usually match very closely their chosen nook. Aurelian's still much greener than most but he's on a rather young, fresh, twig. He's also producing a russet colour similar to the russet on the joint.

Guy

Clever little cuttlefish

Isn't he just, Gibster?

Yesterday I ran a 20km race along the Rhône. At about 3km a red admiral cruised past me and a little later a brimstone emerged from the woods on the right and crossed my path. It was a beautiful day - perfect conditions for running - but those were the only two butterflies that chose to enjoy it with me.

Today, further up the Rhône, I found 7 different species flying, bringing my weekend total to 9 species - quite nice for the middle of November.

Gleaming Adonis blue males were easily visible in the dying grass, even though there weren't many of them about:



Here is another, that preferred the rocks:



The only other Lycaenid on the wing was small copper, of which I saw three:



They are much less conspicuous than the Adonis blues.

Many walls were on their very last legs...



... but some looked much fresher and still have a week or two of flying left in them:



This is one of the elite few species I have in the past found in December (the others being small tortoiseshell and clouded yellow - and nothing else, I think).

I watched a male Berger's pale clouded yellow chasing a female. At one point he sort of crash landed about two metres ahead of me and lay on his side, flapping his wings, like an old man panting after amorous exertions. He might have been trying to keep his body temperature high, as it was quite cool today, even in the sun. I got this rather awful picture of his upperside as he flapped:



Then he got up and flew after his beloved again. She wanted none of it. In total, I probably saw 7 or 8 Berger's clouded yellows drifting about on the hillside - this is another very conspicuous butterfly.

There are still a few clouded yellows on the wing too:



The other species flying were a couple of small whites and a few Queens of Spain.

Finally, this female mantis - an unusual sighting for mid-November - thought I couldn't see her:



That is one of my very favourite non-butterfly insects.

Guy

Hope the run went well - most butterflies can outpace me these days
We still have one or two flying over here - nice to see such a variety in the Rhone valley; makes me yearn for a return to France and Switzerland....
Having to resort to flowers and mushrooms to photograph now...

Cripes Nick. I just saw someone in King's Lynn with a hairstyle just like your dandelion clock. Also a wannabe Lewis Hamilton on a so-called mobility scooter - pedestrians scattering in all directions (minor exaggeration, but he WAS fast and furious!)

Jack

Even in the Rhône Valley butterflies are thin on the ground now. We have had solid sun since my last post, giving plenty of opportunity for flight, and one by one they are all running out of batteries.

With sunny days come cold nights. This photograph was taken while the bells of a distant church were striking midday, showing that in the shade temperatures are struggling to reach zero:



Nevertheless, Queens of Spain, walls and Berger's pale clouded yellows were all flying on that bright patch of hillside in the corner.

This male Queen of Spain may well enter hibernation and make it through till January or February when the first Queens of 2012 will be on the wing. The low winter temperatures here are an advantage to weak hibernators like this:



This male wall was in reasonable nick too, but he won't hibernate - walls don't appear in the spring until about April:



Provisionally, the forecast is for continued sun through to next weekend, at least.

Guy

There was a strong thermal inversion today, so at 9.30am I was wandering around Villars (1250m) in a T-shirt but by the time I had cycled down to the valley my hands were frozen numb. At Martigny, where I got off the train at about 11.00am, the temperatures were well below zero - I kept my coat on for the rest of the day.

Despite this, two clouded yellows, two Queens of Spain and a wall crossed my path. The clouded yellows were in good condition:





Both the Queens were off the path, down among the vines, where I couldn't get at them; the one proof shot I got from some distance showed a less fresh individual:



My chances of seeing my first ever December Queen are not too good as it looks as if the weather might break in the middle of next week.

I spent a little while looking for purple hairstreak eggs and was amazed to find many of the oaks in apparently fresh leaf - and some with burst flower buds and catkins. I don't know how unusual this is, but I've certainly never noticed it before in November:







Here is the Valley in the heat of the day, looking rather cold under trapped haze:



Guy

Winter arrived about a week ago, much to the relief of anxious ski operators. Nevertheless, a break in the cloud was forecast for today and I headed off to the valley on the long-shot that I could find that elusive December Queen of Spain.

With morning temperatures well below zero and a high risk of black ice, I didn't cycle down the mountain but instead cycled up to Villars and caught the train down. Crossing the valley by bike at about 10.45am I had to zip up my jacket and my hands were numb with cold - so I assumed butterflies were off the menu for the day. How wrong I was!

Before 11.00am, my first wall appeared. It was very flighty and I didn't chase it, but did get this shot:



Higher up the hill another, equally flighty, wall was flitting about and sunning. It boded well...



At about 11.45am I found what I had come for - a Queen of Spain fritillary. What's more, it was a lovely, fresh male, not long on the wing:





After I got those record shots it flew some distance away and I left it to its own devices, sunning itself up on a hillock. This is quite probably its last day of activity in 2011, as snow is forecast for the valley tomorrow and rain and snow for the week ahead. It needed to warm up, nectar a bit, and find somewhere appropriate to go dormant for the rest of the winter, not be chased around by a photographer. It was the only Queen of Spain I saw.

Here's the scene in the vineyards today:



It looks cold, and it was cold - but even the winter sun carries some strength this far south and there were local warm spots. Here's a clouded yellow enjoying one of them:



It was a pleasure to watch him feeding avidly, oblivious to the fact today was quite possibly his last altogether, as clouded yellows very rarely make it through the winter.



A red admiral flew by and at about 1.00pm I saw another clouded yellow. While we're on the topic of 'lasts', this is probably my last butterfly of 2011:



By coincidence, Matt Rowlings was in the same region today with his family (he e-mailed me after we were both back), and although he missed Queen of Spain he added Berger's pale clouded yellow to the list, bringing the total species count between us to 5. Not bad for December 11th!!

After 1.00pm the sky progressively clouded over and I headed home:



Here are a couple more pictures you might not expect to have been taken in December, just 10 days before the solstice:





Guy

I am amazed at what you are finding. And lovely photos too.

Jealous Jack

I was pretty amazed too, Jack. By coincidence, I was at the same site on 11th December last year. Here are a couple of pictures for comparison:





There were no (adult) butterflies to be seen that day!

Guy

Lovely images, Guy. Is that Queen of Spain slightly aberrant? It seems to look a bit unusual.

Unless I'm missing something, David, I think it's within the normal range of variation. The exact pattern of spots - size, darkness, position (to a lesser extent) - is very variable, so every individual looks different. It would probably be possible to recognise this chappie again if he were to reappear next year. In fact, some research suggests itself: I should take photos of as many individuals as I can in November one year and see if I can match them to spring butterflies, as I did with red admirals earlier this year. Marking them up would obviously be better, but I'd have to learn how to do this properly first.

Guy

Maybe it was the effect of the light - low winter sun leading to darker appearance. It's just I thought the hindwings were more heavily spotted than usual and the paler forewing spots at the apex were more vivid than I recall (I'm not terribly familiar with this species, having only seen about a dozen in the 'flesh' - I would say your own photos of QOS provide the bulk of my visual knowledge this butterfly).

Hi Guy
I almost cannot believe you are still seeing butterflies as late as this, and with temperatures so low as well. Astonishing!
We have had some sunny days,in between the showers,but not a sniff of a butterfly-and i wouldn't expect it.
I,like several others,am VERY jealous!
Kind regards,Mark.

Love it! Great to see there are still butterflies flying in the Rhone Valley.....
N
PS. Have you seen "Mongrels" on BBC3...you should!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00swyx1

The heavy snow arrived yesterday. Last Sunday's butterflies were most certainly my last of the year - the season is officially over.



Guy

so instead of stunning butterflies to be jealous of we get stunning scenery

Chris