Butterflies

First butterfly of the year! – 4 Small Tortoiseshell, Aglais urticae, have been seen in and around our Falmouth garden over the last couple of days (8/9 March).

Worringly these are our first butterflies of the year! Normally by now we would have seen all the common overwintering butterflies such as Comma, Peacock, Red Admiral and Small Tortoiseshell.

Hopefully the poor numbers are a reflection of the predominately overcast cold weather we’ve had since Christmas and not a reflection of poor butterfly breeding during last years dreadful summer.