Re: Bugboys mission
Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2016 7:31 pm
Never mind Wurzel, just think of all those brownie points you'll be racking up for later in the season
5th April part 2, Tottenham Marshes
I arrived back in London after my abortive day in Surrey to find the sun was back so I stopped off on my journey home for a couple of hours at Tottenham Marshes. There’s several sheltered sun traps here where you can pretty much guarantee butterfly activity and the first one didn’t disappoint, a Peacock, a Comma and 2 Small White all active. The Whites weren’t going to settle for anything other than a female White but both Vanessids did. They were a little worn and also a bit flighty so to avoid my shadow scaring them off I decided to take a few pics from different angles, some rather pleasing backlit shots. After 20 minutes with them I wandered off to find a couple more Small White males exploring a field. One crash landed near me when the sun went in, allowing me to sneak up on him before the cloud passed. I had quite a few Peacock flybys as I wandered around before stumbling on another basking. This one was in better nick than the previous one. After some more wandering and several more Vanessid flybys I returned to the first sun trap to find there were now 2 Commas and 2 Peacocks flying around, the new arrivals both being in much better condition. The sun was getting quite low now meaning they were both less flighty as they absorbed what rays they could before roosting. Since I already have hundreds of standard pictures of both species I took the opportunity to see just how close they would let me get to them.....quite close as it turns out I love the intensity of colours and the iridescence on those blue scales.
5th April part 2, Tottenham Marshes
I arrived back in London after my abortive day in Surrey to find the sun was back so I stopped off on my journey home for a couple of hours at Tottenham Marshes. There’s several sheltered sun traps here where you can pretty much guarantee butterfly activity and the first one didn’t disappoint, a Peacock, a Comma and 2 Small White all active. The Whites weren’t going to settle for anything other than a female White but both Vanessids did. They were a little worn and also a bit flighty so to avoid my shadow scaring them off I decided to take a few pics from different angles, some rather pleasing backlit shots. After 20 minutes with them I wandered off to find a couple more Small White males exploring a field. One crash landed near me when the sun went in, allowing me to sneak up on him before the cloud passed. I had quite a few Peacock flybys as I wandered around before stumbling on another basking. This one was in better nick than the previous one. After some more wandering and several more Vanessid flybys I returned to the first sun trap to find there were now 2 Commas and 2 Peacocks flying around, the new arrivals both being in much better condition. The sun was getting quite low now meaning they were both less flighty as they absorbed what rays they could before roosting. Since I already have hundreds of standard pictures of both species I took the opportunity to see just how close they would let me get to them.....quite close as it turns out I love the intensity of colours and the iridescence on those blue scales.