Hallowe'en "Butterfly Of Doom"

I've missed my granddaughter acutely today. This is the first Hallowe'en for years that we haven't carved a pumpkin together. I hope she has fun at the party she is attending with her Liverpool Dental School pals.

Red admirals were on the grapevine again so I set out to capture the orange and black part of their wings, the colours of Hallowe'en. As I was doing so I remembered that I had read that red admiral butterflies are considered by some cultures to be symbols of evil.  Great numbers of them migrated from North Africa to Northern Russia, where it was called the ‘Butterfly of Doom’ because it first appeared in 1881, the year Tsar Alexander II was assassinated and the markings on the underside of its two hind wings seems to read ‘1881’”. The Red Admiral is considered the favourite butterfly of author and amateur lepidopterist Vladimir Nabokov; it’s mentioned throughout his writings, taking a prominent role in the 1962 novel Pale Fire. 

I photographed the butterfly when it settled on an Innis & Gunn beer bottle that MrQ had left on the wall. Easier than on a grape leaf in the breeze. :)