Springtime in lockdown

So apart from the whole Covid 19 virus and lockdown and thousands dying, this Springtime has been really good! Okay let's try that again. Have you noticed the amount of blue skies and sunshine days recently, far outnumbered the traditional April showers? And what with the lack of traffic on the road and in the skies and lack of people in the streets (initially) you could almost hear the earth breath a sigh of relief. Foxes were spotted climbing staircases in Waverley Station, the blossom on trees has been lovely and the gorse flowering on Arthur's Seat seems to be more luminous, more coconutty than ever before. I have to admit, being an outdoors person, I wasn't terribly keen on the Stay Indoors motto. I believe the stats show that it wasn't the outdoors that was spreading the infection so much as the indoors. And that if you weren't overweight or have an underlying health issue or BAME then you maybe weren't in a high risk group. In fact it almost seemed like those who have paid no attention their health, while blindly marching on consuming like there was an endless resource of materials, overworking themselves so they could afford the latest unnecessary phone, were now getting something of a wake up call.

Talking of phones I had an idea. I don't know if the 5G phones have gone on sale yet because I am so 2G. I don't own a smartphone and won't get one till my perfectly useful Nokia from the land that time forgot stops working. But let's say 5G phones haven't gone on sale. I don't want to get all David Icke here but if everyone, and I do mean everyone, didn't buy one, how long would it be before vast swathes of tech groups nose dived? I reckon a month after they launch and NOBODY bought one they would be half price or cheaper. 2 months and the heads of tech CEOs would be on railings outside their headquarters. I mean nobody actually needs a 5G phone, right? We've survived up till now without one. It's just another way of using up precious minerals and resources with very little difference from the one in your pocket right now. And if you could swap a day of your working week for that item you don't need, wouldn't that be a great deal? A three day weekend every week? Because surrounding yourself with less unnecessary expenditure means more time off. If lockdown has taught us anything it is that we can manage with less. You could be out looking at butterflies.

So here are some photos I took around the third week of April. I kept meaning to return to work in April but there were so many sunny days I put it off till the following week. And so on. I don't have many overheads (having spent wisely and avoiding phoney upgrades) so could afford to spend more time running and cycling. I had put on weight over Winter that I was finding increasingly difficult to shift so was glad to be enjoying the process rather than glumly going out for a punishment run. I was extremely cautious of other humans, mentally visualising that EVERYONE has C19 and also from their point of view that I had. And that it was deadly. Which it clearly isn't in every case. But imagining the worst case scenario is the best way to proceed regarding social distancing and responsibility. I was amused to hear 2 friends saying they also hold their breath when going past folk who show no sign of caution and distancing. Me too. Place is rife with zombies.

Small Tortoiseshells. Lots of them this Spring. The males will sit just behind the females and romance them; wafting wings and tapping antennae. And probably singing songs we can't hear. They have been in decline in some areas so it is great to see loads in the Lothians.

Holyrood Park has always been a favourite venue. I have run there regularly since I started running over 20 years ago, and have never tired of the roads and trails. However I was never really aware of the variety of wildlife there. Perhaps because I was too busy running. When I read in a butterfly book Holyrood was known for however many species I was doubtful. However over the last couple of years it has proved to have the widest range of species of any spot I know in Scotland. And new species still turning up. Walls weren't there until a couple of years ago and this year the Green Hairstreak made the leap from the Pentlands to Holyrood, a spectacular arrival! And just in time for lockdown. 

The photo above: I noticed this dude scramble up the notch, the easiest looking line across that mid-section of Salisbury Crags. The crux looks to be about 12 feet above where he is now. He seemed to make it as we saw him descend the crags as we traversed them on the other side. I have so far managed to resist the call of that notch. Looks do-able though!

sunshine on the bog

Wells O'Wearie

more tortoiseshell shenanigans

Not to bore myself of the usual places I'd jump on my bike and risk the wrath of the social media police who like to sit in judgement on other people's behaviour. Fuelled in part by envy, but mostly because restrictions of the lockdown have made everyone a little cranky. And we all like to point a self-righteous finger at arseholes. For instance, I was very unimpressed to hear 4 people old enough to know better (26~31y/o?) had got themselves stranded on Cramond Island and called the coast guard who took a boat out to transfer them to dry land and an on-the-spot fine from the constabulary. In my day if we had got so stoned we missed the crossing back we would have waited 6 or 8 hrs for the next one. (If they called for help, they could have called to reassure worried parents etc.) Or waded ashore with wet trousers. It reflects very poorly on those numpties that they didn't have the native wit to sort their own mess without making the newspaper. 

2 commas in the same pic is rare
these 2 were debating territorial rights with a fly-off

I've really enjoyed the Orange Tips this year. Another burgeoning species that seems to grow in numbers from 5 years ago when one or 2 a year seemed normal. Maybe I'm just hunting them out more. They are the best of the whites, the males having those dramatic orange wing tips to warn birds their food plants have pumped them full of bad flavours and they aren't worth eating. Very cheery visually and always a welcome sign of Spring!

I found a great corner of the cyclepath where a comma was ganglording it over his area and Orange Tips flying through stopping on the dandelion flowers. It didn't seem like a particularly great place for butterflies but I spent so long there and got such decent photos I didn't feel the need to head any further out of town, so after a good while, got back on the bike and cycled home very pleased.

a lot of the OTs weren't stopping

 even a peacock came by

A few days later on the 24th April I headed out again in search of solitude and wildlife. I parked my bike in a likely spot and had a bit of a wander. A couple of larger white jobs floated through the woods and I noticed with delight one landed quite high on some foliage. I crept up with ninja stealth keeping my eyes on the prize while trying to step gingerly through the undergrowth without looking where my feet were going. I got a couple of pics before it soared off, just enough to confirm the first (official) Large White of the year.

And I think these may be the first lady Orange Tip pics this year too. They don't have the flash of orange but they do have great underwing interest which raises them above the Small Whites. I haven't seen many Small Whites this year. Defo a few about but either the photos weren't as good (easy to overexpose an all white butterfly) or they just haven't been stopping for photos.

Green-Veined White

GVW on Few Flowered Leek

So I found a spot - a corner by a river where there was next to no human traffic and loads of butterfly action. I took a moment or 2 to take photos and wondered for the thousandth time what is it about one spot that attracts butterflies over another. After a bit of a look around, past the dead log in direct sunlight where the peacock was basking, and peaking through the wild garlic and few flowered leek was the answer: blue nylon rope. There will almost always be some of this or the orange stuff. Butterflies love it as a background resonance.

Okay I'm only going to bore on about this once but it always comes up at this time of the year. What are those plants that smell of garlic and can I eat them? Answer, Wild Garlic and Few Flowered Leek. Not the same thing, hence the different names, and easy to tell apart when flowering. The GVW above is on Wild Garlic, Allium ursinum known as Ramsons, buckrams, broad-leaved garlic, wood garlic, bear leek or bear's garlic. Grows in moist woodland and yes you can eat the flowers the bulbs or the chewy bits in between for all I care!

Few Flowered Leek Allium paradoxum, smells the same when you walk through the woods but doesn't have similar flowers. (More singular and with a bulb thing (technical term!)) Which doesn't stop most folk thinking it is wild garlic. It is not though: it is an Asian species of wild onion native to the mountains of Iran, Caucasus and Turkmenistan and invasive in Europe. Edible? YES! Both of them make me want thin pizza bases rubbed with garlic butter and crisply fired. 

both Alliums in the same photo to compare

why do nettles not sting butterflies?
One of nature's mysteries.