Herself...

Here is Herself, egg laying today in a privately-owned wood in NW Bucks. The photo needs some photoshop work but in the original you can make out the egg coming out of the abdomen. She was laying remarkably low down, on both narrow-leaved and broad-leaved bushes, including on 2m tall sucker growth growing out of a ditch.


Here's the freshly laid egg. The egg changes colour after a couple of days -

And here is Herself, a veritable minx at the best of times -

On Wednesday 29th I visited Savernake but struggled to see lone males in three of the seven top territories I searched, suggesting that the butterfly was only just starting there - it is a 'late' site. Did anyone see it any earlier????

Tomorrow, at dawn without breakfast, I head for Fermyn Woods for a long weekend, staying in the cottage in the woodland meadows. I wont be able to blog direct but will send verbal reports via a Kindred Spirit... I seek Iole, nothing less...

Perplexed, or should that be purplexed

I bumped into Chris Dennis at Finemere Wood today when shortly after this male iris made an appearance. Chris had already seen three males all at the same time on the main track. Maybe the season is sparking to life.

We followed him for at least half an hour in which time he moved over a dozen times but never going far. He always returned to the path to continue taking up salts. Something very strange appeared to happen during this time. When he first arrived it was quite difficult to see the purple sheen, care had to be taken to get the correct angle to the sun for it to show at all. Even then the purple colour was quite subdued. However as time passed the purple colour appeared to become more and more intense. After half an hour the purple sheen was not only intense but could be seen from nearly any angle. During the sighting the sky filled in from broken clouds to overcast and rather grey. I also took a lot of photos during the sighting which when reviewed in sequence appear to confirm the colouring up phenomenon. I have no explanation for this apparent behaviour and wondered if anyone else had witnessed anything like it.

Doings

Brother Neil in (rather than on) ecstasy - near Billingshurst, W Sussex, Tues 28th June, just before the thunderstorms... The storms were utterly amazing. At their zenith - with rolling thunder and horizontal lightening all around - a male iris was batting about in a W Sussex wood? Nb in 1975 I watched a 3am flight of iris during the best sheet lightening storm I've ever seen...

Concerned Of Sussex

Today I was joined by Matthew Oates in a raid on Botany Bay. But rather than a shed-full of grounded Emperors, ideal conditions brought only 3 males out to play, despite much looking. We are both getting rather concerned that we have a poor iris season to contend with. Although Matthew has seen good numbers of White Admiral and Silver-washed at AHF, a similar malaise seems to have affected all of these summer woodland species in Sussex and the Surrey borderlands. Hutchinsoni Comma numbers are down here too. Perhaps all of these species, which operate to a similar calendar, have been adversely affected by the abrupt change from excellent to rubbish weather at a critical time? At least those magnificent beasts that did show up performed well, with repeated returns to the forest floor, finger-sitting and prolonged periods of tongue-wiping (on the leaves of low foliage) to remove silt particles from the proboscis after 'salting'.

Oakley Wood car park

Sightings of iris around the Buck/Oxon border have been hard to come by so far this year. One site that has provided several sightings is the car park at Oakley Wood, Bernwood Forest. At least a couple of males have been regularly coming down to the track leading into the wood from the car park. This male was imbibing something unpleasant there this morning.

Alice again

Popped back to Straits at about 9.30 this morning with a friend and we were only 100yds into the ride when a pristine male landed at my feet for aquick photo - perfect. He diddn't hang around long and made two or three tentative landings before ascending into the oaks.
After walking right down the main ride there was another high up on the way back but I think it was the one seen earlier.
No more sightings here so went over to Abbots wood at about 11am where there was one oak edging in the ride up to the car park and one on territory in the pines.
At Goose Green two were present in the chesnut adjacent the wayleave and both decided that a passing swallow was fair game and set off in hot pursuit.
Stopped off at Straits on the way back and walked the whole ride and found one oak edging betweenthe two deer towers.
In all I think there were six individuals across the three woods.
Mark T

Oversley Wood, Warwickshire

I had a successful trip to my local Emperor wood yesterday (26th June). Immediately upon arrival at the congregation area at 1:30pm, i was greeted by the sight of 2 males in combat flight at the top of the pines. Plenty more sightings over the next 45 minutes, especially from one male who seemed to enjoy swooping from perch to perch over a small area he had clearly claimed as his own. At one point, a poor bird stupidly flew a bit too close to his Majesty's perch and was chased away at top speed. I left the congregation area not long after and had a walk around the wood, hoping to see a few Emperor's flying over the Oaks at known hotspots but no luck. Returning to the congregation area at 4:30pm, there was more activity in the same area so its likely that these individuals were the same ones as seen previously. Another sighting of the 2 males chasing each other was rather entertaining to watch, as was the one male that decided to land so close to the edge of a pine stem, he got blown off his perch by the wind.

2 more Emperors were seen late morning on the ground by John Carter, one only fleetingly but the debate is on as to whether they were male or female. These sightings are the first in Warwickshire so far. On my best count last year, i had 19 sightings and an estimated 12 individuals. Lets hope Oversley Wood has an equally successful Emperor season this year!