The meadows are looking quite glorious at the moment, swathes and swathes of Pale Flax, their delicate blue flowers turned towards the sun.
In amongst this wonderful array large patches of white from the Ox-Eye Daisies, with occasional clumps of pink Sainfoin, plus the yellows of Rough Hawkbit, Bulbous Buttercup and Meadow Buttercups.
Despite the earliness of the hour lots of butterflies are fluttering about including the Small Heath (alternate orangey-brown and grey as they fly) and some tiny flashes of silver and dark blue as Small Blues move around the Black Bryony, Clematis and Honeysuckle.
Yesterday’s butterfly transect saw 14 species, including 4 types of Skipper – Dingy, Small, Large and quite a few Lulworth. A couple of Painted Ladies, a Speckled Wood, Red Admiral, Wall Brown and what looked like an unusually small sized Ringlet – the chocolate colour and cream rings on the underside spotted. I was also surprised to see two Meadow Browns, a butterfly I normally expect in June
The Blues also showing with the more lilac Common Blue contrasting with the turquoise of the Adonis Blue – although as they fade with age they annoyingly become more difficult to tell at a glance. It seems that in the warm weather they settle less and fly quickly!!
Again this morning the glorious sound of a Skylark pouring down from the sky, while other flutter just above the long grass in the fields being dropping down and scuttling to their nests.
Flitting across my path a group of Linnets, pink patches just visible, while taking flight from a May blossom covered Hawthorn, was a Cirl Bunting.
More wonderful flowers to enjoy including Dyer’s Greenweed, Common Spotted Orchid, Wild Clary and the extravagantly named Corky-fruited Water Dropwort. As well as clumps of the furry yellow and green Crosswort.