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| European Wall Lizard, Podarcis muralis |
On Monday I saw some blue sky so went off to Mill Hill to do my last butterfly transect of the year. I saw only one Meadow Brown no doubt due to the wind and lack of sunshine.
On Wednesday we had our first work party of the winter at
Heyshott Escarpment. I joined Mark Colvin and 5 members of the Murray
Downland Trust who organise this important work. We were clearing the slope of trees and shrubs to
enable primroses, foodplant of the Duke
of Burgundy, to grow.
Yesterday was a very blue
sky morning so I headed to Shoreham Beach to find the European Wall Lizards
reported by Richard Roebuck on our Sussex BC sightings page. Mark was also
curious to see these rare immigrants and joined me as I was photographing them. Apparently two
subspecies of this lizard were released by a collector over 40 years ago and
have thrived in one small area. I didn’t
see the emerald green subspecies. I saw one adult run fast towards a small juvenile which escaped by jumping off the vertical face of the wall it was clinging to.
There were quite a number of Large Whites on the Sea
Kale, plus a Red Admiral which posed for me. It then headed towards the surf,
landed again then took off and headed south over the sea about a foot above
the slight swell.
After a quick check at Mill Hill for Clouded Yellows we
drove to the Bramber roundabout where a Clouded Yellow had flown in front of
Mark’s vehicle earlier. We explored new territory but the CY remained elusive.
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| European Wall Lizard, Podarcis muralis |
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| European Wall Lizard, Podarcis muralis |
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| juvenile European Wall Lizard |
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| Large White, female, Pieris brassicae on Sea kale. |
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| Red Admiral, Vanessa atalanta |
This is the Red admiral that flew south over the sea
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| Red Admiral, Vanessa atalanta |
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| view from Heyshott Escarpment |
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| Mill Hill |
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| valley near Beeding Hill, Bramber |
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| Comma, Polygonia c-album |
Cow pat covered by burrows of a Dung beetle, Aphodius contaminatus
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| Dung beetle, Aphodius contaminatus |
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| Scabius |
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