Wednesday 28 August 2013

Butterfly Survey: an Alternative View....

Yesterday we carried out the August survey of butterflies for STERF, the butterfly atlas project; (more of this to follow in the next couple of days).

Reviewing our photos last night we realised what a variety of things catch the eye whilst we're out doing the survey. So the following are some examples of an alternative view of a butterfly survey...

A strange plant I don't remember seeing before...

Many of the hedgerow shrubs and trees had very 'holey' leaves This creature and its dozens of brothers and sisters, could be the culprit...

Part of the area we survey is close to water courses, so dragon flies and damsel flies are evident, though photographing them is a bit of a hit and miss affair. Colin captured this first one beautifully...

And last of all we spotted something of even greater interest to us, particularly as it was nearly time for our evening meal...

In the interests of accuracy I should point out that these blackberries (all 2lb 3oz of them) were not found in this 'ready-to-serve' state. They have been washed and de-bugged especially for their photo shoot.

Also we have censored the photos of us getting scratched and prickled to within inches of our lives.
"This photo contains scenes of a distressing nature" 
is not the caption you really want to read on a blog about life in Braye!!

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've been out blackberry picking as well. One of my favourite late summer activities

Tim said...

The strange prickly fruit is a Thorn Apple...
highly poisonous.
From the Americas I believe.

But what on earth is the rotting, rolled leaf in the second picture....
a discarded stuffed vine leaf?

Colin and Elizabeth said...

Lady Justine, Blackberry picking is one of my fondest childhood memories. I used to love spending hours searching and picking the fruit and then helping to bake delicious blackberry and apple pie or crumble. Wonderful!

Susan said...

Hmm, so you had the same experience as me on the late August survey -- the blackberries were more interesting than the butterflies :-)

Colin and Elizabeth said...

Tim we thought you may have had some idea... it looked like it contained some creature!

Tim said...

No.... just some big black seeds.
Pauline informs me it is a member of the Datura family.