Small Skippers are Fluttering

 Last week on our campus, the hot weather brought the emergence of the well named small skipper butterflies. 

These dinky orange butterflies with the wing arrangement that always makes them look like the flights of a dart were far too busy flying about to settle anywhere. 

Today, however, they were happy to feed off ragwort and pose for photographs. However, this was complicated by the fact there was a very strong wind blowing across the badlands, and so you had to find one sitting on a shorter plant that wasn't being blown almost flat to the ground. 

So I present to you this fine specimen. 

Also captured today was a new insect for me, albeit a common one. A red spotted parasite fly, so named for its sinister habit of paratising moth larvae. Of course, this was sitting on the stinky curry plant that seems to attract the underclass of the insect world!

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 24.06.25