www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

Next Monday 10th October at 9pm on BBC 4 - a program featuring the Painted Lady in which they follow it's journey from Africa across Europe - just seen the advert Looks interesting - and unusual to have a whole program devoted to a butterfly for once

Have a goodun

Wurzel

Hi Wurzel,
I was hoping to send them a few pics but I struggled to find any recent Painted Ladies recently. Then when I do see some it is too late, typical! Looks interesting though. I did send in a few pics, on spec so maybe they will be featured. From what I know about the programme, it is largely being made from enthusiasts contributions. Compared to other people I have seen very few Painted Ladies this year. The Isle of Wight, Breamore, Hants and Seacombe Valley in Dorset being the only places I saw any.

Regards
Mike

Excellent they have finally announced the date - I've seen the advert for a week or so which just said "coming soon".

Wasn't there also an ITV doc in the making?

Best wishes,

Lee

I think this is a joint venture between ITN and BBC4 according to the programme's twitter feed.

Regards
Mike

Thank you very much Wurzel. I had seen this advertised a few weeks ago, but didn't know when it would be on. I will be out on Monday night, but I have set it to record.

Hi Folks,
I no longer have access to UK telly down here in Marseilles.
I used to have free to air channels by satellite but they have narrowed the footprint and I now receive nothing at all.

If someone has the technology and know-how to record the programme, from UK telly, about the Painted Ladies, I would appreciate a computer-viewable copy (MP4 or something not too heavy Byte-wise ?) so I could watch this topic subsequently down here on my laptop.
Thanks in advance to any audio-visual / recording technology boffins.

Chris

Can you not get BBC iPlayer? If you can that would be a way round it - and then you can watch it whenever you want.
Have a goodun

Wurzel

Wurzel wrote:Can you not get BBC iPlayer? If you can that would be a way round it ....
Wurzel

Hi Wurzel,
BBC iPlayer detects whether or not you are in the UK and consequently blocks access for me.
I cannot go undercover.
I am officially a foreigner.
Zut alors.
Chris

I didn't know that it did that - but it explains why I had to suffice with 'Bob Ross' on YouTube when I was on holiday in Lisbon . Sorry I couldn't be more help, my suggestion was at the limit of my technological savvy

Have a goodun

Wurzel

Hi Chris,

You may be lucky and someone will post the entire thing on You Tube, just a thought.

Best wishes,

Lee

Just set it to record, tucked away on BBC4 I'm bound to forget it! looks like a 90 minute program as well , wasn't expecting it to be more than half an hour!

A lot of interesting facts in this programme, which probably surprised many non-specialists. I found it all a bit too diffuse and think it would have benefited from tighter editing. [Perhaps I dozed off but was there any mention of how the loop is closed, to start the next generation?]

EDIT I must have dozed - I looked at the iPlayer after my original post and there was a description of the return journey near the end!

Pity there was so much irrelevant or just 'entertaining' material that the main thrust of the programme was lost. Even the Rothamsted harmonic radar got into the act, although I cannot see its relevance to Painted Lady migration! (I wrote a pioneering paper on harmonic radar way back in 1977, since when it has become a useful tool for tracking bees in a local area)

I agree with you, Mike. That should have been an hour programme at most. It left you wondering whether you had missed something whilst making the tea, like the distribution of the parasitic wasp. But I did learn 2 or 3 things.

Yes, I thought the programme was too long as well. I don't think you missed much, Bertie

One or two interesting things discussed. I am not yet entirely convinced about the parasitic wasp being a factor in the migration of the Painted Lady from Morocco. I thought it was just climate and availability of the host food-plant(s). Did the lady narrator say that it takes 3 days for the butterflies to reach Britain from north Africa or did I mis-hear? Perhaps I dozed off too

ATB

Peter

Ditto to the above few comments. It seemed like a confusing mixture of cutsy fluffy meandering thoughts and hard science which didn't really gel which was a shame because there was a top notch program banging on the door to be let out in there.

peterc, yes she did say that but then later on in the program it was explained that it took several generations to reach the UK so that would have been rather confusing to people not in the know.

On the plus side its not often we get 90 minutes devoted to butterflies, even tucked away on one of the 'lesser' channels!

Yes, it did seem a bit meandering at times, and it seems strange to complain about a butterfly programme being too long but I think it could have been edited a bit better? In all I think it was pretty informative and I guess the academics will have got the evidence they need to prove the parasitic wasp theory. I presume some evolutionary pressure would have been brought to bear to ensure that any Painted Ladies that remained perished at the hands of the wasps thereby giving an genetic advantage to those that migrated?
I think that point was made that some pioneer butterflies do indeed travel to the UK in three days, but these normally occur early in the year [January and February] in small numbers and do not normally breed - consequently there are no returning progeny? The main migration is made in stages, with most breeding on the way with the offspring from these eventually arriving in the UK in late June and July - they did seem to hurry over the return journey and how those went on to complete the cycle though, which would have been very interesting.
In all a thumbs up from me
Kind Regards
Mark

Lee Hurrell wrote: .... You may be lucky and someone will post the entire thing on You Tube, just a thought .... Lee

Hi Lee,
You were right, I think I've got it on You Tube here :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzOdgFFX5gk

and I'll watch it later with interest.

Cheers, Chris

Chris: In Switzerland I can get all freeserve UK channels (legally) on http://zattoo.com/. For a small subscription, I get a week in arrears, too, so I can watch programmes at my convenience without adverts - and/or record them. I think zattoo works from France too, though I don't know which channels are available there.

There are many not-so-legal ways of changing your IP to a UK IP while browsing from abroad but I won't advertise these publicly on a well respected site like UK Butterflies!

Guy

We tried to watch it last night in southern Switzerland(near Locarno) on FilmOnTv on my laptop, which I think is legal(all campers watch it) but it kept buffering probably due to all our blinds being down in our van, as it starting at 10pm over here.
I'll watch it on catch up tv next week when I'm home.

Russ

Thank you Guy and Russ,
I'll check out your suggestions ready for next time.
Chris