First

My first butterfly of the year, as usual a Small Tortoiseshell but only the second time that I’ve had a first sighting in February.

The sunny day helped, and I made a couple of extra visits to the community garden hoping that I’d find one, finally being rewarded in mid-afternoon.  And a first bumblebee of the year too, in more or less the same spot a few minutes later (extra) - I think that was a queen Buff-tailed.

13yo and I had a walk down to the Dam and back through the woods. The ground is starting to dry up a bit but still plenty of muddy patches. We saw our first Lesser Celandine of the year in the woods so it is good to have the springtime flora up and running too.