Following four hours of walking round Fermyn Woods in Northants witnessing an excellent viewing of Purple Emperors, we finally headed back to the car. We had been discussing an attempt at photographing all the 56 breeding butterflies in Britain, and today we realised how hard it will be to photograph the Hairstreaks. We had only seen Purple Hairstreaks at the tops of the trees and briefly perched, and the White-lettered Hairstreaks did stay still and show...at the tops of the trees again. We did talk about bringing a scope next time to try and digiscope them.
As we walked off, Paul Brewster shouted us back. We walked back and there at eye level was a pristine White-lettered Hairstreak. We couldn't believe our eyes. It was sitting there sunning itself and then it started to move along the branches. We slowly edged forward and we soon were watching it quite closely. It was a fabulous way to end the day.
at first it was a bit hidden
but then came out to sun itself
and we managed to get closer
and it moved towards us
and eventually it showed quite well
