The fine weather earlier this week – at the end of March 2021 – saw the emergence of some butterflies, Peacocks and Small Tortoiseshells, from their winter hibernation. Although they are hunkered down somewhere over the cold months, you would probably never find them (unless they are inside the trunk of an old tree), as…
At first sight, the Meadow brown butterfly might seem a little drab – certainly next to its colourful cousins, like the Peacock or the Red Admiral – but the more I have photographed it (particularly fresh specimens) the more I have come to appreciate what a truly beautiful insect it is. The Meadow Brown, Maniola…
I went to Sulawesi, in Indonesia, primarily to visit Tangkoko National Park and see the Black Crested Macaques (Macaca nigra) known locally as Yakis. At the time, I did not possess a macro lens, so the pictures I took of butterflies were mixed, and I did not do anything with them. With the blessing of lockdown,…
I described in my first blog on butterfly eyespots (Conspicuousness or eye-mimicry?) how they can be effective at deterring predators from attacking them, although the jury is still out as to whether this happens because the eyespots are highly conspicuous, startling signals, or whether it is because they genuinely fool predators into thinking that they…
Insect antennae have been the focus of interest and speculation for as long as people have been observing our six-legged friends. We have seen in previous blogs in this series on Insect Antennae (I, II and III), how they are used for a wide variety of different purposes, from feeding ants, to detecting pheromones and…
Thanatosis, or apparent death, is when an animal pretends to be dead! Lizards do it, opossums do it (‘playing possum’) and butterflies do it! The idea is to fool the pursuer into thinking you are dead, and hope that they will then leave you alone! Female butterflies sometimes do it to avoid the unwanted attentions…
Iridescence is when surfaces – such as the wings of butterflies – appear to change brightness and colour as the angle of view, or the angle of illumination, changes. The iridescent wings of Morpho butterflies are some of the best examples. The spectral reflectance changes with the angle of incidence – i.e. the viewing angle…
The courtship behaviour of the silver-washed fritillary, Argynnis paphia (Heliconiinae, Argynnini), is described in most books or websites about butterflies. Here’s how I described it in my book on Courtship and mating in butterflies. The male …. performs a unique pursuit flight, swooping down beneath the female, then darting up in front of her, until…
This site was created following the demolition of the old Futurist theatre on Scarborough seafront. Demolition of the building began in June 2018 and was completed in August 2018. A process called ‘slope stabilisation’ created an area of sloping ground (below) which, in this year of lockdown, has filled up with wild flowers. Some might…
Red admiral, Vanessa atalanta, butterflies are notoriously territorial, particularly when they occupy their favoured spots in the late afternoon. I have been photographing one particular male this month (24-26 June 2020) which has commandeered a nice little bank of wild flowers in the grounds of a local church, St Mary’s, Scarborough. The butterfly’s territory is…
Ray Cannon's nature notes 