As the weather was good today, I went back to Ditchford to hunt for more Variables. Alas, I could find none, not even the male I saw last week. There has been a majpr influx of Painted Lady butterflies in the county and elsehwere, so I wonder if this Variable was a migrant? At Ditchford, I saw:
100+ Common Blue inc mating pairs (see photo)
100+ Blue-tailed Damselflies inc mating (see photo which shows a rufescens-obsoleta female colour form)
100+ Red-eyes inc many mating
20+ Azure Damselfly
5 Hairy Dragonfly inc mating pair
3 Four-spotted Chaser
Numbers are definately down on what I would expect for this time of year. Perhaps a consequence of the poor weather or a result of the poor summers in 2007 & 2008.
After work, I stopped off at Kinewell Lake, Ringstead to search for Scarce Chaser. Amoung the 100+ Banded Demoiselle, I only saw one, see photo at top, which shows a male just getting the blue colour to his abdomen.
