Aggressive Red Admirals

[ianc]

Do Red Admirals defend territory? when approaching an open area near to our home two Red Admiral regularly dive bomb me, this has been going on for about 8 days, today I took the wife and our dog, we stood perfectly still while the butterflies flew round us at a breakneck speed coming within inches of both my wife me at face height, in fact I thought the two of them were in attack mode and about to set about the dog, eventually we walked away and I presume they settled down again.
Ian Carswell

[Dave McCormick]

I noticed one time when I saw a red Admiral, (not long ago) it was sitting on a bramble leaf in a forest. A couple of Speckled Wood came, the red admiral took off, chased them, then returned to the same leaf. It did it again when a meadow brown passed by.

There where a few red admiral in area, and I knew it was same one that was on leaf at start because it had tattered hindwing bits.

Think they do defend their territory like say, Speckled Wood males. Speckled wood males do it for ages, watched a pair for nearly 10 mins until one was drove off.

[eccles]

Many of the common basking nymphalidae defend their territory. Comma, red admiral, peacock and speckled wood all do so. There's a definite pecking order too. Peacocks will drive away other species but a comma is more aggressive and will usually win a tussle with a peacock. I have even seen commas drive away bumble bees.