Bentley wood Thursday 19th July 2012
My best day at Bentley so far in 2012
briefly...
09.30 - 18.00.
a.m. cloudy & windy with brief sunny intervals & drizzle.
p.m. increasingly warm & dry but windy.
Minimum 3 males together at one site + 1 female.
Much patrolling but none really leaving the tops.
3 males & 1 female widely dispersed elsewhere.
No photos as yet from my cameras.

Mike Coleman

Males go into 'find the lady mode' in mid-Bucks

Up until today, I had only observed male territorial behaviour this season: i.e., sticking to the same clump of trees, fighting with other males, perching and gliding around these trees. Today, the behaviour was completely different. I saw four males in different parts of a wood, flying rapidly [i.e., no gliding] in and out of the tops and sides of trees, including big Sallows, tracking along the rides, and never landing: what Matthew calls 'Oak edging', but, of course, all trees are being searched for females. My first sighting was of a female, flying around and in and out of Sallows, landing briefly, but I don't think she was ovipositing.

Handful Of Emperors

There is little doubt that the start of the 2012 Emperor season has been much later than in recent years; much later than in any season this century. However, although numbers are now building in some counties there is even less doubt that the species has suffered a very significant setback in Sussex. It was therefore with some relief that Colin Knight and I watched two males clashing over the Madgeland (Southwater) Wood Assembly trees at 3.20 pm this afternoon (20th July), these being the first seen here this year. Even better, we watched an already mated female pass through the Trout Lane canopy at 3.04 pm, only to be immediately accosted. She spiralled down into the top of the tall ash and was joined by her suitor. For several minutes we could see a frantic quivering of wings, before he gave up and allowed her to continue her egg-laying run along the southern wayleave. Sadly, this still only makes a handful of sightings in Sussex this year.

Hairstreaks sparring with iris on a dull day in Upper Thames

Wendy and Mick Campbell went to Romer Wood yesterday, 19th July, and were joined later by Dennis. The weather was very overcast for almost our entire visit and quite cool (about 17-18C) but not very windy once we were inside the wood. Before Dennis arrived we stood at the "Poplar Tree" territory which is where we've had our best sightings of iris previously in this wood. We had sightings of two iris in the tops of the trees, but only very short flights. We managed to locate them with our binoculars, one landed in a large ash on the right side of the territory and the second in the top of a Poplar to the left of the territory. At 4.00pm, after Dennis arrived, we saw a wonderful display at the top of the ash. There were quite a few Hairstreaks flying in the ashes and all of a sudden the Purple Emperor which had been sitting in the ash flew up and engaged with the Hairstreaks, presumably trying to chase them out of its territory. For about 30 seconds iris turned into a huge Hairstreak, spiralling, clashing and turning on a sixpence in an attempt to chase them all away. But he was no match for several Hairstreaks and finally lost the battle, retiring to one of the Poplars! We never did manage to identify the Hairstreaks (too far away, so unable to see their colour) - they could have been WLH (Elm not far away), but we suspect they were PH based on the number of them present. Steve - if you get good weather when you go to Romer at the weekend, please could you look out for the Hairstreaks and see if you can get a positive id on any of them. Dennis tells us that he's never heard of iris clashing with WLH, so this would be a first. Our next sighting of iris was of one flying towards us above the track, our third individual. It headed towards the ash tree, circled and then flew back across the track and disappeared behind a large oak. Finally, Mick was scanning the Poplars in an area where we knew iris had been perching earlier and managed to locate it again. Photo (courtesy of Dennis) attached.

In Pursuit of the Ridiculous

Today, Neil Hulme, Brett Westwood (BBC NHU), His Imperial Majesty and I recorded a piece examining what this butterfly is doing to our heads.  This is for a forthcoming new series of 15 mins programmes on Radio 4 (Tx in Nov), exploring the psychology of naturalists and the point & pointlessness of natural history.  Neil was utterly brilliant of course, and HIM even better. 

For somewhat ridiculous reasons we need to be cagey about where we recorded the piece, but it is one of my heartlands, and contains a seriously good sheltered high point male territory.  Suffice it that after a dull, threatening morning the sun began to glimmer and periodically break through briefly, and for nearly 2 hours from 12.30 iris ruled the universe before suddenly quietening down. 

At least one male was almost always in view and we had several vistas of three and four, one of six and Brett even managed seven (which is still the most I've ever seen in a vista).  That's a reasonable tally, even by the standards of this place.  The males weren't particularly violent here today, for once - a Great Splatted Woodpecker managed to escape with its life, though a Nuthatch was duly spliflicated. 

At 1.30 a female (Neil's and my 1st of the year) appeared and was instantly followed by a male.  She led him a merry follow-my-leader dance away into a distant oak clump.  Unfortunately we were unable to locate a pairing.

The programme will examine the importance of the rare, beautiful, mysterious and elusive in our lives, the fascination of cracking the Emperor's ecology, the role of this butterfly in assisting personal journeys into and through Nature, the importance of places of deep belonging (heartlands), Nature-addiction Disorder as the corollary of Nature-deficit Disorder, and the need for a special season when all is well with the world and we enter the trance of Nature.  It will also be extremely silly. 


Sadly, that's the last I'll see of iris until Monday, as my annual Butterfly Weekend at the Kingcombe Centre, W Dorset, was forced to take place 2-3 weeks early by the Olympics (the last thing I needed was a late iris season...). 

But this weekend will see the butterfly at peak season at most of its sites, and the main emergence of the year at places like Fermyn Woods where it hasn't really got going yet.  Seize the day - and please report your doings to this blog (or just email derekcva@gmail.com and he will post it for you).  To the woods!

A classic day in Hertfordshire

Well what a day!!!! Forecast okay, nothing special but we had no intention of staying indoors! Arrived Fir and Pond Wood near Potters Bar, at 12:37, hadn't even got my chair set up with Andrew shouts one round the tree. Where I say? in the oak says Andrew (the wood is full of oaks but I knew he meant the bonsai!) then a clash of two males and we left very satisfied almost as quickly as we arrived. Sun was shining, perfect conditions. So we hot footed to Bricket Wood and were in situ at 13:15 and watched and waited while another bank of cloud came through. Purple Hairstreak were active and there was some sun but still no activity. Back into the wood to be greeted by more mosquitoes, a bit more sun and still nothing so at 14:30 we left. We then went to our first ever area in central Hertfordshire. Splitting up I went to one wood where Purple Hairstreak and a White Admiral were active, Andrew to watch the canopy of his first ever wood but it was fairly cloudy and no activity. Unfortunately, the other wood we look at had a tractor doing a hay cut where we normally watch, so we went inside the wood, to watch our famous ' turkey oak ' the only true master tree which in recent years has been very inactive but today......We sat down to watch at 16.05 and left at 18:20. There was a bit of sun but at times it really was quite cloudy and we reckon the air temperature was between 17/18d, the tree was sheltered and at 16:18 his majesty flew up the side of the tree and until 18:18 continued to be active. There were infact two as we had a clash but we were treated to the most amazing display of activity neither of us have ever witnessed before in all the years we have been watching in Hertfordshire. Remember this is Hertfordshire not Hampshire, Sussex or Northamptonshire a county with a very low density level. The key emperor was the most aggressive emperor we have ever witnessed, anything that came near was chased or fought. He spiralled and turned with a Red Admiral, not a simple chase, he fought it, he chased crows, pigeons, goldfinches......and the arguments he had with the Purple Hairstreaks, he was clashing, turning, twisting, chasing them and in turn they were equally aggressive. He flew over the tree, round the tree, off the tree nonstop. He perched, he waited and pounced on another unsuspecting victim. Five o'clock came, would he continue, yes six o'clock and he still kept flying and finally at 18:18 it became too cloudy for him, he had flown round the back of the trees so we had lost him and .........the mosquitoes had finally won! We left the site and went home very satisfied with an extradinary day!!! Liz and Andrew

Current State of Play

Another vile day here in the Purple Empire...

Spare a thought for people trying to visit Fermyn Woods.  Last week produced a modest afternoon on the Wed, a reasonable day on the Thurs but after a cool night (which always leads to inactivity and a poor emergence), but otherwise a load of grot.  Sunday was reasonable, but clouded over at lunchtime until late.  Mon had some sunny intervals + much Stygian gloom.  Then more grot since.  In effect, the butterfly hasn't been given the chance to get going there yet.  This weekend, which is supposed to be nice, should see the first decent emergence of the year there - don't miss out on Big Bang Day at Fermyn!

Elsewhere, some good news from Alice Holt.  'BB' (alias Mark) saw 9 exploring males in Abbots Wood Inclosure, which is a fine tally for there, and there have been reasonable sightings in Straits Inclosure (relative to the fact that the main breeding ground there was largely obliterated in Feb 2010).  The primary territories are producing reasonable tallies, though it seems that several of the secondary territories are unoccupied.  All the evidence suggests that this is a late rather than a disastrous year here. 

One of the problems is that Purple People have become skilled at spotting the very first males of the year - what Heslop called 'pioneer males' - which can appear several days ahead of the first proper emergence, especially in a poor summer.  Thus 'BB' and I saw 2 in Alice Holt on the 5th, a good week ahead of the true start, and my male in Fermyn Wood on Mon 9th was a real early bird.