Small Change

Drama in the house today.
Our bathroom must once have had a fireplace which long ago has been plasterboarded over. Gales in the recent or distant past must have dislodged the chimney cap because this morning we heard noises behind the wall and although Mrs Gen2 thought it was a rat suspected a bird.

As the noises were still evident an hour later (a rat would have climbed out), I knocked a hole in the wall behind the bath. Nothing immediately evident, but 15 minutes later, out popped a juvenile starling. I didn't traumatise it further by trying to immobilise it for a blip - I just opened the window and it thankfully flew straight out.

That meant I still had to find a blip, but went out straight after lunch to a known butterfly haunt and got you this:- a Small Copper, Lycaena phlaeus.


This butterfly (yes - another one) is my blip because it is the first and only one that I have seen of the present brood.

I looked in two places where I have seen them before but nothing. I found this in a totally unexpected location.