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| People enjoying the park. Jubilee Country Park butterfly walk, 15 July 2012. |
The park is not just for small groups of butterfly-hunters. These are some of the many walkers who enjoy it. Those blue flowers are Chicory, the park's symbol, and the small white ones are Corky-fruited Water-dropwort, which is rare in this part of the country. Or, it was until the Council's mowers spread it around the local country parks!
On the butterfly walk, the first things we found were moths. I like moths and spent some time trying to photograph them. There are several species that commonly fly by day, and others that are easily disturbed. But this one is not often seen other than at night.
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| Large Yellow Underwing, Noctua pronuba. Jubilee Country Park butterfly walk, 15 July 2012. |
We didn't know what it was on the day, but strangely I recognised it as soon as I saw the photo. Here, it is concealing a lower pair of wings which are mostly a vivid orange-yellow colour, and which flash brightly when it takes off.
I chased this next one for a while; it's worth getting a good photo of.
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| Yellow Shell, Camptogramma bilineata bilineata. Jubilee Country Park butterfly walk, 15 July 2012. |
Only small, but nicely marked. We also saw some Green Oak Tortrixes and plenty of grass moths, both of which can be expected in a meadow surrounded by oak trees.
And what about this beauty ..
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| Dung Fly, Scathophaga stercoraria. Jubilee Country Park butterfly walk, 15 July 2012. |
It's a Dung Fly. But Scathophagas, adult or larva, don't eat dung; they eat other creatures that eat dung. The larvae are stuck in the dung because that's where the eggs are laid and they can't fly away, but the adults will happily eat other insects wherever they find them.
Then there were these:
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| Hogweed Bonking Beetles, Rhagonycha fulva. Jubilee Country Park butterfly walk, 15 July 2012. |
Despite some scepticism evinced on the day, these really are known as Hogweed Bonking Beetles, and you can google it to prove it. It was no coincidence that we first spotted them engaging in copulation on a Hogweed flower. I have also seen them called the Common Red Soldier Beetle, but that is much less memorable. Beetles like this are called Soldier Beetles because some of them have smart red and black patterning which was thought to resemble an old-fashioned soldier's uniform. Here are some others I posted recently:
Two Cantharids.
It wasn't all insects. There are lots of interesting plants in the park, including this delicate Smooth Tare:
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| Smooth Tare, Vicia tetrasperma. Jubilee Country Park butterfly walk, 15 July 2012. |
And other creatures: small mammals, reptiles and amphibia, like this toad I found while looking for moths when I was supposed to be after butterflies.
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| Common Toad, Bufo bufo. Jubilee Country Park butterfly walk, 15 July 2012. |
