Sat June 27th: Muggy, Still & Cloudy

Change in the weather, to warm, muggy cloud, with hardly a breath of wind. Perfect Emperoring weather! They love it, and are fully active.

Back at Knepp, after a week elsewhere. People had struggled to see PEs at Knepp during the heatwave, but that changed today: most of the favoured male territories were occupied, with males sailing around joyously, and some females evident. 

Three 'tumbledowns' were seen: descending spiralling flights with "Hi! I'm Andrew Tate" males circling around an "I'm washing my hair tonight" mated female. At the last second she will do a U-turn, hoping that he will crash land and smash up his top range performance motor. This behaviour was first observed by KJ Willmott at Bookham in 1983 - Heslop never saw it, nor me till Knepp. It's common at Knepp during the second half of the flight season.

Here's a female basking in a sloe bush yesterday -

And here's a more typical view of a female (again, yesterday): they spend hours sulking in sallows, all but out of view - 

Today, though, Sunday 28th, the wind has returned. Leeward, leeward and leeward...