www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

Here is the opportunity to post your favourite photo(s) of a particular species taken in 2012 (or the last time you saw one!).

This is part of a series of topics which will grow over 20 weeks throughout the winter until all 59 UK species have been covered. The intention is to showcase three species per week (in alphabetical order), so please wait until a topic has been opened by me for a particular species before posting photos. Our overseas friends are very welcome to fill in the obvious gaps relating to rare UK migrants.

Details of locations, dates, times and circumstances would be welcome and please feel free to contribute observations of behaviour, stories of personal encounters, anecdotes or other interesting points.

Vince

Pearl Bordered Fritillary
This is my favourite shot of pearl Bordered Fritillary as it reminds me of a cracking day at Bentley Wood. It was cold, cloudy and there wasn’t a butterfly in sight all morning. During lunch we contemplated heading somewhere else but decided to give the Eastern Clearing one more shot. Things started to pick up with a Speckled Wood, Ashy Mining Bee, a long horn Moth and Spruce Carpet all falling under my lens.
A huge shout of “Wurzel” saw us running across the clearing to where RobS had found a Pearl. Then we found a Duke, then another Pearl, and another and then two more! Not only was there excellent company but we had our very own mini emergence. Sublime! My favourite shot is of Pearl number 4 which was freshly emerged and grimly hanging to the twig while its wings dried. I like the contrast with the background, all grey which reflected the weather nicely and contrasted with the glorious patterning of the “April Fritillary”. Have a goodun

Wurzel

My pic of a PBF was taken, where else Gaits Barrow it's not the best of pic's in fact I wasn't sure at the time that it was one
I took the shot on the 4th of June 2012. That day was a very good one for me as I saw the White PBF on the same day Goldie

This one of my favourite early summer butterflies. I love the way it skims and glides through the woodland. The photographs below were taken in Hailey Wood, Glos. Peter.

nomad wrote:This one of my favourite early summer butterflies. I love the way it skims and glides through the woodland. The photographs below were taken in Hailey Wood, Glos.

The underside shot of PBF on the bluebell is a cracker, nomad.

Thank you David, I was pleased to find a Pearl Bordered on a bluebell and pleased with my photograph.

PBFs were quite kind to me during the spring of 2012, not least because the awful weather meant that they sat around doing very little for long periods, opening up at the merest suggestion of sunshine. This shot of a male was taken at Rewell Wood on 24th April.
Neil

I had a very sunny late afternoon on 1st May for my trip to Rewell Wood, and the butterflies were very active. They were numerous, but it was really difficult to get good pictures. However, I like this one with two in shot, because you can see both top and underside.

Dave

It was a grim day at Rewell Wood at the start of the season that I took the attached photo. Luckily for the people on the walk lead by Sussex Kipper he came up trumps and despite being freezing cold by the time I got home I had some great memories and some pictures of the target species.

The beginning of May was atrocious throughout the country, so spotting any variety of butterfly was something of an ordeal.

I visited Ewyas Harold Common in Herefordshire on an abnormally cool May day (10c at best) and although I only saw a handful, they were all semi-torpid due to the temperature which made approaching them much easier than normal.

I had a similar experience to Susie - I was on the walk led by Kipper on the 29th of April, when he managed to magic up some PBF despite the cold wind and almost constant rain

A visit to Rewell Wood on May 2nd produced several Pearl Bordered Fritillaries (including this beauty resting in blubells) amid cool cloudy conditions, ideal for photography.
At the end of May i visited the Wyre Forest where i managed open wing shots both from above and below.

I only saw Pearl-bordered Fritillaries on the one day last year. I had seen that there were good numbers around at the Wyre Forest but with a limited amount of time available I timed my visit to hopefully see both Pearl-bordered and Small Pearl-bordered Fritillaries. In this I was successful and saw good numbers of PBFs in various states of wear plus some nice fresh SPBFs.

This was also my first trip out with the Panasonic FZ150 that I had bought to replace the FZ38 that I passed on to Chris.
Cheers,

Neil F.

Taken at the Wyre Forrest 10th June - again a first

Debbie