Arnside Knott pt2

Arnside Knott is a limestone hill , at around 500 feet above sea level and is covered with species rich limestone grassland and mixed woodland. Surrounded by water on 3 sides .The site attracts a variety of insects and is especially renowned for butterflies. There are outstanding views from the summit to the Lake District and Morecambe Bay.


The next species to find at arnside was the small pearl bordered fritillary,Boloria selene.  although  it was a bit late in the season for them,  hopefully i could find a few still around.
they like areas of open heather ,woodland glades and clearings.  near the top of the knott is a large open area facing north which looked perfect for them.
the area in the top right hand corner is where i found my first ever small pearl bordered, another new species ticked off the list for 2011.

Here is my first shot taken

Then by luck found one perched on a grass stem!  and managed with some difficulty to get a side on shot

I then watched a female egg laying which was great , but could not get into a position to photograph her. moving on i followed one of the small paths and came across a high brown frittilary feeding !

Closely followed by another small pearl bordered feeding on heather.  this shot shows how beautifully marked the under wings are .

I then decided to move over to the large area below the car park to find more high brown fritillarys, this area of braken is set out in three terraces and is the best place to see the high browns.

This is the view from the second middle terrace

Down here i found quite a few dark green fritillarys , but found it very difficult to tell the high browns apart without seeing the underwings .

Dark green fritillary

and with beautifull backlighting

and a high brown as a comparison

down on the lower terrace in the more open areas i found several common blues which appeared to be in prestine condition, they are a beautifull species when viewed up close.  they were feeding on ragwort flowers which does make a colourfull background in the images .

all shots taken with canon 5d2 and 100mm Macro 2.8 L.

ARNSIDE ADVENTURES WILL CONTINUE WITH THE WOOD ANT STORY!

Arnside Knot Butterflys june/july 2011 pt1

My next target species for 2011 was the rare high brown fritillary  Argynnis adippe , only found in a few sites in the  south of england and in cumbria .
Visiting Arnside Knott for the first time, i hoped to see quite a few new species of butterfly, including the high brown,dark green and small pearl bordered fritillarys which i have never seen.
Arnside knott is surrounded on 3 sides by water,  and has a very specific habitat for these butterfly species.

The first area i came to was heathwaite meadow on the southern side of the knott

A wonderfull sight seeing all the daisys  and my first sight of the big beautifull dark green fritillary Argynnis aglaja  feeding on the flowers.

Contiuing around the lower slopes i came across my second new species of the day, the northern brown argus,Aricia artaxerxes , a small butterfly similar to a common blue.  it is only found in the north of england

I continued to climb higher up the knott in search of the prefered habitat of the high brown , bracken !

climbing up this slope i eventually found a promising area

This was the area i spotted my first ever high brown fritillary

A newly emerged specimen, wings not even fully hardened off, perched on a bracken stem  and then after i managed a few shots it flew up into a tree, where i shot the second  image .

Just after shooting this high brown i came across a dark green fritillay perched on a bracken stem , which in this shot clearly  shows the difference between the two species with the high browns extra underwing spots.they are very difficult to tell apart from the upperwing view.

Here is a view from near the top of the knott looking towards the cumbrian fells

i continued around the northern side of the knott to the steep shale paths to hopefully find Grayling butterflys ,Hipparchia semele  which like to rest on the warm stone,  on the steepest path which goes down to the carpark i found at least 20 grayling in a small area, so there had to a huge number on this side of knott.   they blend in very well with the surroundings but where easy to get near to photograph,  but difficult to get exposure correct in the bright sunlight!

The Arnside adventure will continue.......

Oversley Woods 3rd July 2011 pt 3

In the early afternoon i met Gill up in the centre of the woods at the purple emperor "congregation" area , where the males rest in the top of the pine trees on the look out for females and give  "arial fighting"  displays!
I really never thought i would ever sit and watch butterflys in "combat flight"  flying 100ft in the tree tops, but having been told all about it , i just had to see what it was all about!

 3 hours later, we where still watching them!   arial fighting between the tree tops over a 50 m long area in the pine trees above the central clearing!   i really cant describe how exciting it actually was, but i still remember it in every detail now, 2 months on!  and cant wait to see it again next year.
i think this day was the influence for all the years butterfly shots

here is Gill shooting the emperors in the pine tops!

this shot was taken by Gill  ,  taken with canon 300mm L & 500d .  [better than any i got ]

after all the excitment ended in the tree tops,  a number of freshly emerged red admirals  "Vannesa atalanta" arrived in the clearing and started resting on the bracken fronds, one even nearly landed on Gills head!   that would have made a great picture! lol
they looked amazing in prestine condition, one of uks most beautifull butterflys but so often overlooked in the search for less common more interesting species!  which is a real shame as a few of our common butterflys are stunning!

shot with canon 5d2, 100mm L MACRO handheld

here is Gill shooting Vannesa  which you can see on the fern frond in this 2 frame focus stacked image

and here is Her  picture as shot above

many thank to Gillian for allowing me to use her images

Oversley Purple Emperors 3rd July 2011

The next part of the day at oversley wood near alcester continued with the rest of the party returning back the way we had already come as no emperors had been seen!
I decided to continue around the wood following the main path heading towards the pond to hopefully see a few dragonflies.  
After just 50 metres around the next bend, there on the path in front of me was a Purple Emperor !   i could not believe it,  i managed just 2 shots before it took flight!

A few minutes later another one appeared and started feeding right in front of me!    by this time 4 members of the party must have seen me photographing something and came to look, they all managed to shoot this amazing elusive butterfly for over 5 mins before he flew off!

love the yellow proboscis !

Seeing the emperor , my 7 th new species on the day!   amazing!  

I then continued around the woods and eventually came across Gill and a few others from the group, they had also seen  emperors grounded on the other side of the wood!  i think most of the party actually saw them which is exceptional considering the nature of this species, people spend years looking to get a single sighting of one!   the weather changed 2 days later and i dont think any more where seen after that day!  a very short season for them this year as they are easilly damaged by strong winds while resting high up in the tree tops!

This has to be one of the highlights of my year, i never really expected to see one as they are very elusive, spending most of the time high up in the tree tops, only coming down "grounding" to feed / take in salts ,

 Later in the afternoon Gill  promised to show me the "congregation area"  where the emperors fly and fight high up in the tree tops above the pines in the centre of the wood! 

The Beggining of An Obsession With Butterflys July 3rd 2011

This is the day my obsession with butterflys really began !

Gillian invited me to come down to the "Oversley wood"  purple emperor event  hosted by the warwickshire butterfly conservation   http://www.warwickshire-butterflies.org.uk/.    as it is a 2 hour drive i arrived an hour early to have a look around part of the wood, before the guided walk starts to hopefully see the p emperors .
after a 15 minute walk i found a small meadow area surrounded by trees and in the middle i spotted my first ever  Marbled White, a species i have always wanted to see!   i took about 40 shots of a prestine specimen before finding a second one!

  the second marbled  then flew off and landed on a thistle flower and started feeding. by the time i got close enough to shoot ,another butterfly landed which turned out to be my second new species of the day!    a small skipper!
to say i was happy is an understatement, 2 new species in less than half an hour!  with the rest of the days events still to look forward to.

i then walked back to the carpark to meet up with the rest of the party for the guided walk. in total 41 people turned up all wanting to see the purple emperors,  which i believe is a record for a branch event!

as the walk started, after a few minutes i spotted my 3rd new species of the day, a white admiral but couldnt manage any decent shots,  this was probably the best shot  i got -

as the walk continued through the wood ,someone spotted a newly emerged purple hairstreak, my 4th new species of the day!     in not very good lighting i managed to take a good series of shots of this beautifull specimen!

 it was at this point Gill arrived, late as usuall!!!!!!    just as the light disappeared so she could not get any decent images!      she was not happy!

The hunt for the purple emperors which we all hoped to see "grounded" feeding on salts on the paths was not going too well, not a single one spotted !   but we did find good numbers of Silver Washed Fritillarys all along the paths feeding on bramble flowers,   which was new species #5 for me !

The event leader suggested that we go back to the meadow where i shot the marbled white, as white letter hairstreaks had been seen in the trees near the path,  on arrival about  6 wl hairstreaks were seen in the elm tree but too high up to photograph unfortunatly,  but yet another new species for me  #6 for the day!

and the best was yet to come!