26/8-1/9/09: in my garden and up the road

26/8 - 1 x Green-veined White
27/8 - 1 x Common Darter Dragonfly
28/8 - at least 17 Starlings took off from a run of Rhododendrons in a neighbouring property that adjoins my garden

29/8
- 1 x Yellow Shell moth

- this (so far) unidentified species of moth:


- this Square-Spot Rustic moth:


30/8
- 1 x 22-spot Ladybird
- 1 x Silver Y moth

- this Small Blood-vein moth:


- 3 x Vine Weevils on top of Sedum spectabile flower heads (after dark)

31/8
- 1 x Painted Lady
- 1 x very ragged Common Blue butterfly
- 1 x Fox lying in the middle of the road at 10 p.m., at the crest of the hill just round the corner, whilst another was crossing the tarmac half way down my road

1/9
- 1 x Wood Mouse on compost heap

Not so common Blues in Barnehurst

The two Blues found in Barnehurst are the Holly Blue and Common Blue. Neither is abundant.

Holly Blues tend to appear one at a time, and generally fly higher than Common Blues, sometimes re-tracing particular 'circuits' of shrubbery.

Holly Blue on Camellia in my Barnehurst garden, 19th May

The Common Blue is a bit more gregarious. Numbers on an allotment site in Barnehurst - never high - appear to have been very poor last year, though I wasn't around so much.

On the day of the mating pictured below, three were seen at once on the most favourable plot, flying about randomly at about 4' off the ground. The favoured nectaring plant was Geranium pyrenaicum (white-flowered form).

Common Blues mating in a Barnehurst allotment, 22nd May

A few days later I had this female in my garden, pictured at rest on the purple-leaved cultivar of culinary Sage.

Female Common Blue in my back garden, 28th May

If Common Blue caterpillars do develop in this area, Black Medick is likely to be the main foodplant.