Saturday, 12 March 2011
At Last!
There should be a picture with this post - and very beautiful it would be - but I'm having trouble downloading images onto the blog (or is it uploading? I wish I understood all this stuff). Anyway, this was the day when - at last! - I saw my first butterfly, in fact my first butterflies, of the year. The sun was out this morning, with a springlike warmth in the air, and I was out of the house as soon as I could manage - and my first butterfly was waiting to swoop down and greet me just along the road. Indeed it drifted down almost vertically, like a falling yellow leaf - a Brimstone, of course! - took a brisk circuit of a little dandelion patch of a front garden (more, shriller yellow), flew off strongly over the passing traffic and was gone, leaving me with a gladdened heart and no doubt a daft grin on my face. I was actually on my way to the station to take the train to Ashtead, where in the course of an hour or so walking on the common I saw half a dozen more Brimstones - and, basking in the early spring sun, a fresh and beautiful Peacock. The butterfly year has begun!
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Excellent! I haven't been out looking yet but hope to over the next week. I wonder which one it will be this year. You are right: it really does mark the start of a new turn of the wheel. Brimstone, peacock or a surprise? I'll soon find out.
ReplyDeleteYes I've seen a few here in VA USA too. But that hardly counts does does it? First was actually on February 21st when the temperature hit 70F.
ReplyDeleteI do always remember the first of the year in the UK though. In Gloucester for the last 10 years it was always the Brimstones. And they were impossible to photograph! Never stopping for a moment they would drive me crazy. Overwintered Tortoiseshells were always another early head above the winters parapet.