First Butterflies

Small Copper

In Dutch: Kleine Vuurvlinder. In Latin: Lycaena Phlaeas.

 MAE © 2012

The last butterfly I took a picture of was a Small Copper back in October 2012. There could have been more butterflies later, but I just did not look for them afterwards. However, there were not so much butterflies anyway last year. A combination of available flowers and the bad weather of last Summer resulted in a significant lower amount of butterflies. This trend will hopefully not continue, because I wouldn't want to think about what would happen to the balance in nature.

Back to the Small Copper; I have only seen one ever, but it is a beautiful little insect. You can find them almost anywere, which is just as well, since I only spotted this one.

Today I finally spotted butterflies again. In fact they are all from the same family: the Nymphalidae. All three are active in the early Spring and can be found in open landscape and grassland. They are the Comma, the Peackock (both seen today at Copse Wood, Middlesex) and the Small Tortoiseshell (seen earlier today at Croxley Common Moor) respectively.

I did see one or two Brimstones  as well (in Dutch: Citroenvlinder. In Latin: Gonepteryx Rhamni) but they did not want to be caught in front of my camera. Let's  just hope there will indeed be more butterflies this year. The signs were positive today, since they were all chasing each other in packs of four. These proceedings have hopefully resulted in some reproduction.

Comma 

In Dutch: Gehakkelde Aurelia. In Latin: Polygonia C-Album.

MAE © 2013

Peacock

In Dutch: Dagpauwoog. In Latin: Inachis Io.
MAE © 2013

Small Tortoiseshell

In Dutch: Kleine Vos. In Latin: Arglais Urticae
MAE © 2013