Two for the price of one today!
It’s always a joy to see the blue butterflies emerge; it’s like a tiny piece of the sky has fallen to earth and is flitting amongst the flowers and shrubs and along the trees and hedges. The first to appear locally are the Holly blues. My first, on 2 April, was in an unlikely place; as I walked past, it flitted out from the street-side hedge of a house a few streets away from where I live. There was no Holly or Ivy in sight but perhaps those larval plants were growing in a nearby back garden that I couldn’t see in to.
Next to appear, just a couple of days later, was a Small white that was already looking a bit tatty. It seems its short life was proving to be a challenge, escaping from bird attacks or, perhaps, getting snagged in vegetation. My second Small white was pristine, feeding along a field edge so abundant with Blackthorn blossom that the area had attracted six species of butterfly: as well as the Small white, there were Speckled wood, Comma, another Holly blue, Brimstone, and my first Orange-tip of 2025 (which will feature in a future blog, as soon as one stays still long enough for a photo).
