Green Hairstreaks at Donna Nook

 For a change,Tuesday 9th May turned out to be potentially favourable for photographing the tiny green hairstreak butterflies at Donna Nook on the Lincolnshire Coast. Green hairstreaks are the only British butterfly to have green wings and with a wingspan of only 30mm are very small, in fact the UK's smallest butterfly is the small blue which has a wingspan of 27mm.

Roger and I arrived in the car park at the same time and were soon heading along the dunes to search for our target. Disconcertingly the sky had clouded over since leaving home but we were encouraged by the blue sky to the north from where the weather was coming and the sun soon appeared. Green hairstreaks are very faithful to territory and, as it is an annual pilgrimage for us to find these beautiful butterflies, we knew where to go. Although they can be found all along the Lincolnshire coast, their favoured location at Donna Nook is only about 50 square metres.

Nearly as soon as we reached the spot we found our first individual and as the sun warmed up and they became more active, we eventually found 10. Despite having emerged a couple of weeks previously most were in superb condition. One or two, though, were starting to look worn so we had only just got there in time.

There followed a couple of hours of delightful photography. Keeping half an ear out for birds as well, I enjoyed hearing the scratchy song of the plentiful whitethroats and my first cuckoo of the year elicited the usual thrill.

A New Butterfly.

 Over the weekend we visited Heather's brother in Ashwell in Hertfordshire to help celebrate Maureen's retirement.  Knowing that there was a strong colony of chalkhill blue butterflies on Therfield Heath just outside Royston I was keen to explore as July is in the height of their flight period. The heath is a nature reserve and site of special scientific interest on the chalk escarpment near Royston.  Although there is a golf course it is common land and sheep are still grazed there.  I managed to squeeze in two visits: one on Sunday morning with Malcolm and Maureen and one with Heather on Monday morning 'on the way home'!  On both occasions it was warm but very windy making photography very difficult. The blues were easy to find being right next to the car park and on the Monday I counted over 30 within an area only a few yards square.  As its name implies, this is a butterfly of chalk and limestone downland, to which it is restricted because the larval foodplant, horeshoe vetch, is similarly confined to this habitat.  The males are a lovely silver-blue whilst the females are brown as in common blues.  I was much take with the beautiful white heart-shaped mark on the underwing of both sexes.  In Britain it is restricted to southern England, south-east of a line from the Severn Estuary to the Wash

To view large, please click on an image.

Female

Male

Male

Male

Female

Male

Male