Tame heath fritillary

I‘m sitting here in the study, waiting for a phone call from the vet, so I will keep this blog post brief. Last month I had a rather late and hastily arranged trip to East Blean for the rare heath fritillary butterflies. I thought I had already missed them, but on checking back through Lightroom, I found the end of June was an ideal time and so I went the following day.

It’s been a few years since I walked my normal route through the woods. The place seemed to be much more overgrown and what’s more, there was more cow wheat than I had ever seen in my life. Cow wheat is the larval food source for these butterflies, so I was hopeful of seeing them in good numbers… and they didn’t disappoint! There must have been hundreds of them flitting through the more open areas, but none landed until it clouded over some three hours later.

I was just making my way back to the car park, knowing that I hadn’t taken any photographs to make me happy. Then, I spotted a few individuals who had settled in a clearing. I have yet to process most that I took, but here is one that obliged by climbing on the finger that I offered. He stayed put for a good ten minutes and even helped review the images on the back of my camera. Eventually, I needed to head for home and so I put him back on his leaf before leaving.