More Butterflies

So, here we go again. This is Holt Heath, which looks like this in midsummer. As I think I have explained before, this is a bit of a revelation for me as all my previous - and fairly substantial - experiences of heathland has been in autumn, winter and spring. Heaths can be very bleak and desolate then, and nothing wrong with that, I happen to like bleak and desolate. However, seeing a heath in mid summer, bright with colour and positively humming with life, does rather justify all the winter's efforts.

Anyway, on the subject of 'positively humming with life', here are some of my butterfly and moth spots from the last few days. I am indebted to my old cycling buddy and moth expert Jason for a lot of the idents. He saved me a lot of flicking through butterfly books.

A Gatekeeper or Hedge Brown (Pyronia tithonus), which slots neatly into the 'small, brown' category of butterflies. Speaking of which...

A Wall Brown (Lasiommata megera) on some cross leafed heather.

A peacock (Inarchis io), which is one of the 'classic' butterflies, by which I mean butterflies that I can recognise. Unlike the two above, which are small and fluttery  and have to be chased and then snuck up on, this one just sat on a bit of ragwort, wings spread and letting me snap away. Brazen hussy that it was.

This is a Silver Y moth (Autographa gamma), a visitor from the continent where it is widespread. Unusually for a moth, it's happy flying in daylight.

A Dusky Sallow (Eremobia ochroleuca). Also happily flying in daylight, which somewhat negates the point I made above. I never claimed to be an expert. I love the names, too. Speaking of which...

A Large Skipper (Ochlodes sylvanus). Definitely a butterfly, despite looking like a moth. This butterfly is found all over Europe and Asia, as far east as Japan. Which is pretty cool.

For more info, go to http://butterfly-conservation.org/50/identify-a-butterfly.html or http://www.ukmoths.org.uk/thumbnails/, although the second one is slightly terrifying in it's overwhelming detail.

Anyway, here's the only other song I can think off with 'Butterfly' in the title.It's 'Buttefly' by Crazy Town (the band, not the Danish kid's tv show). It does tend to get stuck in your head at times like these. The tune is sampled from 'Pretty Little Ditty' by The Red Hot Chilli Peppers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cn88p4vAwHk and is one of the best bass riffs ever.

Bog Asphodel and Sundews

More pics from the same bog. Here's some bog asphodel (Narthecium ossifragum) in full flower.

Some sundews (Drosera rotundiflora) on a bed of sphagnum moss

And a nice panoramic view of a the same mire in full flower. As I mentioned a couple of posts ago, most of my experience on heathland has been in the winter, when it's all brown and kinda bleak looking, so this comes as a pleasant surprise.

Bullet With The Butterfly Wings

I've mentioned previously about how I tend to prefer taking pictures of plants due the fact that, unlike animals, they stay the heck still.

So therefore, I am marginally chuffed to post this picture of a silver studded blue butterfly: 

The usual procedure goes spot butterfly, see butterfly land nearby, get phone out of pocket, fire up camera, hold over butterfly, focus, take picture. All the while, you're in the vicinity because you have an actual job to do and so have to stop what you're s'posed to be doing and follow the procedure described above. Most times, the butterfly has flapped off by this stage and slowly flits further and further away as you attempt to 'bag' it. This is the original pic:

The silver studded blue is a heathland species, living off typical heathland species such as gorse, heather and bird's foot trefoil and, although there seemed to be loads of them flapping around the area I was in when I took the picture (a marshy part of Holt Heath), is described by the Butterfly Conservation Trust as "A rare butterfly confined to small colonies in England and Wales."  In fact, let them describe it themselves: http://butterfly-conservation.org/50-781/silver-studded-blue.html

Sticking with the insect theme, back home in my own garden, we have spotted these guys on our pear tree:

These we identified as the social pear sawfly (Neurotoma saltuum), for which the food plant is... pear trees. A quick google search reveals lots of tips on getting rid of them but we decided to put our conservation hat on and left them too it. Our pear tree can probably take this one hit for biodiversity.

Anyway, a few weeks after this pick was taken, the cocoon is still there but now empty and the tree is looking fine and dandy, a few leaves slightly chewed but otherwise ok. Don't worry, we'll keep you posted on any developments.

Ask Not For Whom The Bell Heather Tolls...

We're out checking the cows on one of our sites, which was another bit of former heathland pine plantation.  'Checking the cows' involves counting them - none of them have either died, wandered off or given birth - and then giving them a quick visual once over for any obvious signs of injury or illness.

As we ride around the site, I spot a profusion of beautiful purple flowers. Looking around, they seem every where but I don't know what they are. So, I do what I normally do and get my phone out, take a picture and look it up in my wildflower book.

It's a very distinctive flower. I'm not going to say what I thought they looked like at the time, you'll have to use your own imaginations for that, but anyway I looked it up aaaaand it was....

.....bell heather. Yes, bell heather (Erica cinera). With one winter's experience working on Holt heath and two on Godlingston and Studland heaths, plus studying heathland as part of my course I fail to spot one of the commonest heathland plants and one that I've been walking over for years. Oops.

In my defence, all my heathland experience has been in the autumn, winter and spring. At that time of year, heathers are all a nondescript, unhealthy looking brown and you're usually stepping over them to get to the five foot tall, spiky, green and vibrant yellow gorse bushes. But still...

Another Part Of The Heath

Despite being very familiar with Heathlands, having spent the last 3 winters volenteering on two National Trust owned ones, Godlingston and Holt Heath, I'd not actually seen them very much in the mid summer. Therefore, last Thursday came as a pleasant surprise.

We were ragwort pulling on Holt Heath and the bleak, brown, ant-filled wastes of winter had given way to a beautiful panorama of rare plants, buzzing insects and skylarks singing above us.

This is common cudweed (Filago vulgaris) which is a heathland specialist - quite rare although not protected like broad-leafed cudweed. I must admit it took a lot of searching through wildflower ident books to find it.

The whole heath was covered in spider's webs. I believe this is the web of the labyrinth spider (Agelena labyrinthine), a handkerchief-sized web with a funnel in the middle.

And fox gloves (Digitalis purpurea) which were growing through the gorse bushes and looking very lovely.

 Info on these plants and animals looks pretty sparse, so I recommend you cut and paste the latin name if you want more info.