A butterfly hat-trick

My cousin's wedding in Oxfordshire provided the perfect excuse to take the day off work on Friday and visit some sites in that part of the country in search of three butterflies that I've never seen in Britain before. First up was Otmoor, where a walk along the Roman Road just beyond the reserve carpark produced (with a little work) a Brown Hairstreak, which sat up briefly in some blackthorn before disappearing. A good start; unfortunately a tight schedule meant we couldn't explore the reserve itself, so that will have to wait for another time. 

Brown Hairstreak

The Roman Road at Otmoor

It was then on to Aston Rowant, a super site rather spoilt by the M40. However, the short, flowery grassland not far from the carpark, on the northern part of the reserve, yielded my second target, Silver-spotted Skipper (of which there were at least two), plus several Chalkhill Blues.

Silver-spotted Skipper

Chalkhill Blue

Aston Rowant NNR

Aston Rowant also has Adonis Blue (since 2012), but a chance encounter with a local, Chris Bottrell, saw us decide to relocate to a new site, Yoesden Bank. Chris very kindly offered to lead the way, with another local, Peter Law, joining us so. Chris left us once we arrived at the site, but myself, Amy and Peter (who has this blog) had a wander up the site, and although it had rather clouded over by now and was a little breezy, a brief sunny spell brought the hillside to life - Meadow Browns, more Chalkhill Blues, a Common Blue, and target number three, three male Adonis Blues - little stunners.

Adonis Blue

Yoesden Bank

So a very productive afternoon. Aston Rowant and Yoesden are beautiful sites - oh for some chalk grassland in Notts! And always good to meet nice, helpful, like-minded people. I now have five (regular) species outstanding on my British butterfly list - Heath and Glanville Fritillaries, Swallowtail, Lulworth Skipper, and Mountain Ringlet; so some more excursions to nice parts of the country will be required to clean up on these!