www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

From a butterfly point of view, Spring probably started on 6th April this year when good numbers of emerging species were noted.

Everyone is still on the look out for Scarce Tortoiseshells coming out of hibernation but it was a Large Tortoiseshell that was sighted at Lullington Heath near Eastbourne, East Sussex on 6th April by Gary Norman. Photo evidence exists on the Sussex BC website under that date http://www.sussex-butterflies.org.uk/sightings.html .

A Scarce Tortoiseshell was then reported from Pulborough Brooks RSPB reserve in Wast Sussex by George Kinnard on 7th April. Twitter report with photo https://twitter.com/George_Kinnard/stat ... 00/photo/1 . Other photos by the original finder (Jan-Paul Charteris) also exist here http://www.sussex-butterflies.org.uk/sightings.html under 12th April.

Two more Scarce Tortoiseshells were reported by George Brown and Robert Turner in Aldeburgh, Suffolk on 15th April. Details on Suffolk BC website http://www.suffolkbutterflies.org.uk/sightings.html

Another Scarce Tortoiseshell photographed by Phillip Lowe on 19th April near Fareham, Hampshire. Report and photo on Twitter https://twitter.com/plowe315/status/589 ... 28/photo/1

Vince

Found this on the Upper Thames BC website:



This may have been mentioned before, but it sure looks like inter-species courtship to me!

Cheers,

- Pete

I took this one last year in Suffolk:



In this case, it isn't courtship - they're both taking minerals from the same dropping and simply getting in each other's way. So appearances from just one photo can be deceptive ...

Guy

Inter-species courtship was definitely taking place here. This time the other way round
It all ended when another Peacock barged in.
Terrible photo.............

Vince

Vince Massimo wrote:Terrible photo.............

but it shows an interesting butterfly event - well worth recording