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Hi,

We have just spent two weeks based near Gloucester on a mainly butterfly holiday. Fantastic time - saw a total of 28 species 8 of which were firsts for us.

In case anyone is interested the highlights were:

Wood Whites at Brierley (Forest of Dean)

Marsh Fritillary at Strawberry Banks

Small Blue at Prestbury Hill (hundreds of them!)

Adonis blue at Rodborough Common.


Also a visit to Collard Hill (lovely sunny day with 5-6 Large Blues - even observed a female egg laying!)



And a trip to Crook Peak (in Somerset but we followed the sun that day!) where we saw Grizled Skipper and Small Pearl bordered Fritillary.



Total list of species seen (no particular order) :
Wood White Common Blue Dingy Skipper Peacock Small White
Small Pearl Bordered Fritillary Large Skipper Marsh Fritillary
Small Blue Green Hairstreak Meadow Brown Small Heath
Marbled White Small Copper Large White Comma
Adonis Blue Brown Argus Grizzled Skipper Brimstone
Red Admiral Painted Lady Green Veined White
Silver Washed Fritillary Large Blue Ringlet Small Tortoiseshell
Dark Green Fritillary

And my favourite photo of the two weeks - a Large Skipper:


Looking forward to the next trip!!

All the best
George

Now that's my kind of holiday (and I have one coming up real soon!). Thanks for the post George - it's definitely lifted my spirits given the rain outside

Cheers,

- Pete

Thats a holiday I fancy! Love the Large skipper shot to, altough not so much on the Marsh Fratillary. Like your shots George! Must have been a nice time.

Pitty rain is coming agian or I would be out to places like this!

Yes - the female Marsh Fritillary would not keep her wings still!! So this caused me a problem - they were chasing round and round the flower head and I just thought it was an unusual shot.

It was a case of take as many photos as you can as quickly as you can and hope one turns out right!! There must be a word for this technique!

We went back there a week later and the Marsh Fritillaries were all unfortunately gone.

Seems like we also got the best day to visit Collard Hill also judging by the weather reports from others.

The mention of weather makes me wonder what effect will continual rain and lack of sun do to our butterfly populations - particularly those which have or are due to emerge around now.

I have seen a report on the UK-Leps Group that Dukes have suffered this year in the Chilterns due to adverse weather conditions.

On a more positive note I have seen more Small Tortoiseshells recently than I think I saw in the whole of last year and have seen thousands of Peacock larvae.

Even when it is not sunny it is possible to find butterflies roosting or sheltering - and it is continually surprising to me that they always do reappear when the sun returns. However as I started off by saying I do worry about the effect of continual bad weather.

George wrote:There must be a word for this technique!

It's called "Carpet Bombing"

Martin.