Some while ago we spotted a guided butterfly walk around a local reserve, Totternhoe Quarry. The main quarry in the quarry would be the Duke of Burgundy (Hamearis lucina) butterfly. Since neither quarry was familiar to us, we applied to…
At the end of March, with the new Odonata season approaching but not yet with us in England, we were off to Spain for a 2½-week house-and-dog-sitting engagement. “Goody”, I thought, “being further south I’ll get a jump on the…
Madeira’s population is roughly 250,000 in round numbers. About 50% of these live in the capital, Funchal, with its buildings climbing up hills surrounding the harbour rather like the banked seats in an amphitheatre. Today was our last full day…
In Nouvelle Année, Nouveau Guide des Papillons, I introduced my speculative purchase of a French field guide to butterflies. I had wanted to replace my aging Collins Field Guide to the Butterflies of Britain and Europe for some time and…
After yesterday’s excitement of seeing my first ever Downy Emerald (Cordulia aenea) at Sandhouse Lane Nature Reserve, I just couldn’t resist returning today with Carol (she had been out volunteering for the Greensand Trust) in the hope that she’d be…
[Egg-citing Easter was a bit too obvious, even for me, but I thought I should note the possibility.] First of all, my dear ol’ mum bought me a lovely Thornton’s dark chocolate Easter Egg. How much of a big kid…
For Odonata, a.k.a. Dragonflies and Damselflies, that is. It has been a long winter for a relatively new addict for many reasons, not the least of which, of course, were my surgical experiences caused by ridding myself of a freshly…
As summer wanes and autumn thinks about waxing, since we were unable to return to our beloved France for September, we took ourselves down to renew our acquaintance with the New Forest. Billy was very excited to be trying something…
We’ve been back from La Belle France for about six weeks now and it seems a little like a distant memory. Despite our suffering worse weather than we’d hoped, we did seem to reuse quite a lot of pixels on…
It’s always quite a thrill when I see a new species of butterfly. I don’t mean a new one to science, of course, just a species that I haven’t personally seen before. The excitement is usually caused by the more…
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