10-08-2023
Small Skipper (1)
Large White (1)
Small White (3)
Brown Argus (1)
Common Blue (7)
Chalkhill Blue (7)
Peacock (1)
Gatekeeper (9)
Meadow Brown (28)
15.45 - 16.00. I'm clearly slowing down in old age, as I don't seem to have as much time as I once used to to visit Hoop Side on my Stratford Tony - Throope Down - Middleton Down - Broad Chalke - Burcombe Down - Wilton walk before I have to get on my way to catch the bus in Wilton for my train home. The grazing on the slope seems to have changed in the the last couple of years and is having an effect. It is far less of a thick mass of dense grass but supporting a good number of wild flowers, which is presumably a good thing, although perversely there seem to be fewer butterflies on the track along the foot of the hillside. Hardly any MF and no DoB seen earlier this year, and yesterday not the clouds of butterflies that were to be found here in August in the past. Maybe they have relocated onto the slopes. Anyway, several ChB were seen, which was what I was hoping for.
Simon Crampin