Brown hairstreak

I had a wonderful day today visiting Noar hill NR in Hampshire with my friend Josie. We visited mainly to see the Autumn ladies tresses orchids Spiranthes spiralis that grow there with their wonderful flowers that look sugar coated and grow in a spiral formation around the stem (see extra) but even though there were plenty of flower spikes, they were quite spread out and not in great clouds as they had been in 2015 sadly.
Luckily we were distracted by two beautiful Brown hairstreak butterflies Thecla betulae, This female was a bit skitty, but she did come down to inspect some of the low-growing vegetation, and I managed to grab a quick shot.
The Brown hairstreak is the largest hairstreak found in the UK, is locally distributed and lives in self-contained colonies that breed in the same area year after year. Like other hairstreaks it can prove elusive as it spends a lot of it's life basking in the canopy, so I was very lucky this little lady decided to descend right in front of me, and that the couple of shots I took were actually in focus!