Butterflies in the rain!

  John had recently been told about a colony of Purple Hairstreaks in the Luxulyan valley, so we decided to have a look for them today. 

  We found the location and soon saw several Purple Hairstreaks flying around the ash and oak trees. The butterflies did not seem to mind the heavy rain showers and would just walk underneath the leaves to shelter!

  I have always found hairsteaks to be fidgety little creatures and always find it hard to get good photographs! The two pictures below are probably the best of those that I took, the first image being of a male. The second image shows the butterfly nectaring on the sap of the tree. 

I also photographed this bumblebee feeding on the Teasel flowers.

  Afterwards we paid a visit to Cabilla Woods. Unfortunately we did not see many butterflies as it was overcast and we got caught in several heavy showers....again! We did see a few Silver-washed Fritillaries together with Large White, Peacock, Meadow Brown and Brimstone.