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| Peacock Butterfly |
You've probably heard the of the 'chaos theory' concept that the minute disturbances of the atmosphere caused by the fluttering of a butterfly's wings can be the origin of a hurricane or tropical storm on the other side of the world. I'm not sure whether I find that scary or inspirational.
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| Red Admiral |
This year in our garden, I have to say that the more obvious impact has been of the weather on butterflies, rather than vice versa; I have never seen so few as during the present cold, wet summer.
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| Painted Lady |
In previous years our garden has been home to plenty of glorious butterflies and sometimes they even settle long enough for me to get the camera focused on them.
The first seen is often the Peacock, sometimes quite early in March, with Tortoiseshells, Speckled Wood, Meadow Brown and Comma sighted throughout the spring and summer, joined by Red Admirals and Painted Ladies later in the spring and through to autumn.
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| Old Comma on a blackberry leaf |
This year, I have seen very few butterflies of any species, but that doesn't mean they haven't sneaked in unobserved from time to time. Indeed, while my back has been turned there have clearly been some busy in the garden, if not the ones we're happy to see.
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| Shredded broccoli, thanks to cabbage white caterpillers. |
While we were away on our narrowboat trips, the Cabbage Whites must have been about, as we've been picking lots of chubby green and black striped caterpillars off of our lacy-looking brassica crops over the last few days and gleefully dropping the little blighters into the pond.
So be warned caterpillers - mess with our cabbages, and you'll literally be sleeping with the fishes!
