Hundreds of butterflies...

...in my garden today.

It started with a few dozen Peacock butterflies this morning. Then as the light got brighter as the day wore on, many more butterflies materialised.

Many of them were Peacock butterflies, and a couple of hours later there were many Red Admirals. Then suddenly there were a few dozen Comma's.

Then there was one Painted Lady that I saw. There might have been more.

There were more different butterflies including some Whites.

It was a breezy day, so it was hard to get good photos. I probably took over a thousand photos with iPad and phone. I was trying to get them dancing in the sky, but they got out of the photo before the iPad took the photo. So about 300 photos were just blue sky. I got a few of them flying in the sky. The silhouettes were very impressive but I wasn't quick enough!

I managed to get a few photos with one just flying, the others escaped out of frame.

So five collages are in extras.

There were three different species of butterfly sharing a Buddleia flower head, but each time I managed to get iPad focused on it, two had flown off!

I have never seen so many Comma's at any one time. Usually I see one or two.

Every year for one sunny day, maybe for a few more days, I always get dozens and dozens of Peacock butterflies, clouds of them. But I have never seen dozens and dozens of Red Admirals in one go, like I did this afternoon. And never so many Commas flying at one time.

However I have had clouds of white butterflies some years ago. The caterpillars had eaten nearly all my Kale I was growing. I left them be. And it as a wonderful morning in my garden when all the butterflies hatched out. It was magical. The kale regrew for winter, so I still got some kale that year.

I do have a couple of large beds of nettles. I encourage them. I don't know if that is the reason for all my butterflies each year.

These were only the butterflies in the back garden I photographed. There were more on the Buddleia in the front garden.

I love my garden.