still haven't found what I'm looking for

Crazy warm temps for Feb have been tempting out butterflies nearly 2 months ahead of last year's first sightings. Photos are appearing all over the butternet. Seeing Tuesday's forecast was promising double figure temperatures I put aside my work and wondered where might be most likely to find our fluttery friends. I was torn between town and country. I had seen an early comma and peacock at the Hermitage in the second half of April 2018 (after an extended Winter) so that is where I went. 

Being about the wildlife spotting, not the running, I caught a bus to Morningside, where I admired the display of crocus and had a look around for butterflies. The amount of pics on facebook groups would have you believe they are super abundant currently. Although there are a few about, mostly the "hibernating" species (Comma, Peacock, Small Tort, Red Admiral); they are outliers and early risers, likely to return to their hidey-holes after a quick refuel on any blossoming flowers. More recently there has also been somewhat incredible stories of Painted Ladies and Speckled Woods. I'm afraid this got me well overexcited and I was expecting loads of sightings at every bunch of flowers I came across. It is just not so. Alas. And I went from very optimistic to a little chagrined over the course of a long and not particularly fruitful search across town at any spots I thought might harbour warm flowery nooks and windless fluttery corners.

The Hermitage is one of my favourite spots for a slow jog and wildlife search. I arrived just after 10 and it was a bit early as the sun hadn't climbed high enough to warm the tiers of the walled garden. This is where I saw the comma and peacock last year and the place is very insect friendly with two good sized insect kennels on the right of the gardens. The sun slaps the front of the doocot at the top and I hoped the place would be heaving with insect life. It was not. There was a good amount of cheeping and peeping from the small woodland birds and an occasional woodpecker tattoo in the background. But not much in way of flowers and no butterflies. I mooched around for a bit failing to get any reasonable photos of the bullfinch gang that were terrorising the blossoming tree nearby. I was a bit tired from the weekend's exploits and a little grumpy about all the dogwalkers chasing off the non-existent wildlife. So went for a walk in the trees while waiting for the sun to properly warm the walled garden and tempt out the butterflies. 

Just as I was leaving a butterfly dropped like a dead leaf from the tree tops and landed somewhat ironically on the dead remains of a plant used as an insect repellent. It was a peacock and possibly the lowest scoring of the several possible candidates. Mary objects to me ranking species above or below one another. However most of us would get more joy from spotting a kingfisher than a pigeon. So yes, sadly, some species, due to rarity or beauty do get more points than others. It's why footballers get the sort of wages you would normally only expect an important activity would attract.

peacock with a sense of humour

However commonplace, it was great to get my first photo of a butterfly in 2019. As I got closer it flew, in an almost perfect reverse film of the landing, back up into the trees and far away. Oh well, first of many thinks I (idiot!), and went to take some really bad pics of birds in the trees. I did seem to have the camera set on rubbish mode. The light was great but the little birds just looked the wrong way as I pressed the shutter release, or hopped off the branch, or the camera focussed on the branch in front. Lots of wrens about today and I mashed up so many photos of them. A tree-creeper set off up a trunk just yards away and yet I either cropped half of it out the frame or moved the camera too much. Blue tits and a thrush or redwing won't even make this blog such were the shameful results. And the bar is really low today!

first of ahem many

the wren was busy fluffing up it's feathers and grooming

tree crapper

I saw a scree slope with a sunny crag at the top. Perfect for basking insects! The cold air and warm sun reminded me of hot-rock holidays; sports climbing in Majorca and Spain when M and I were younger and braver.  I climbed up between flattened cans of alcopops and super lager to find...

a ladybird

I checked out the river that runs through the Hermitage valley but no dippers. Again I cursed all the dogwalkers whose dogs like to run into the stream and chase away any birds. While nodding hello to them too. Nothing if not polite.

robin refusing to pose

love the bat-art

I returned to the doocot and garden. The wren was still there laughing at my terrible photo attempts. The sun was warming all 3 tiers of the garden but still the place refused to heave with butterflies. I was beginning to suspect how the day was turning out. There is the feeling that elsewhere there are huge numbers of exotic species just waiting to be seen. I could have hung about here for an hour and maybe things would have changed. But I felt I should run past a few of the more wildlife friendly corners of town and see what I could see. At least I'd get a few running miles in.

it is a great setting, and very insect friendly

I went across the Braidburn where lots of daffodils weren't being attended by butterflies, then up and over Craiglockhart with simlar results. Along the canal I was growled at by a sizable alsation whose owner said she won't touch you. After running another few hundred yards (East) I realised I was heading in the wrong direction for the WoL pick up, so turned around and gingerly squeezed past the savage alsation again. Happy days. I dropped down the steps to the WoL path and began to lose the bad mood and actually enjoy the warm spring weather and surroundings. There are various spots where the ducks and birds seem to gather. It is difficult to say what makes these little sanctuaries - it is not the most inaccessible (for humans) places, as you might think. But there are certain spots where all of a sudden there's a wren singing, blossom flowering and a wagtail with a yellow waistcoat goes bobbing down the riverside just ahead. Half a dozen goosanders and a few mallards are lazily treading water and standing on mid-stream rocks with heads under wings. I try not to disturb them as I jog past, taking poor quality pics! 

snoozing goosanders

wren giving it some

grey wagtail

Around here I got my first sandwich out. George was saying the goosanders were being culled on the Tweed due to them taking the young Salmon parr. For culled, read murdered. Humans like to use the term cull when they reduce the numbers of animals by murdering them. Who could possibly kill these glorious creatures just to increase the numbers of fish and punters who pay money to fish, and see that as perfectly okay? Anyway the Tweed birds have become understandably leery of humans and won't get within 100 yards of them. The ones here have become used to sharing the bread thrown to mallards and swans. And will scoot swiftly across the water to share a sandwich.

There was another great display of crocus at Saughton

A pair of dippers were under the large bridge just before Murrayfield. I ran back and forth as they were fairly timid and happy to fly a hundred yards to evade the camera. Back upstream I saw the one collecting moss, presumably to line a nest, unless looking for bugs underneath.

My butterflying pal Iain was making me laugh, reporting his exploits of skulking around in stranger's gardens hunting lepidoptera, with garden owners knocking on windows and shooing him away, pointing at mobile phones and muttering. There are few wildflowers in bloom currently. However many gardens are full of flowers and heathers that might attract butterflies. There is a large communal garden below the flats at Roseburn and I tried to look as if I might be one of the residents just out taking pics of bees, as I skulked around the planters.

If all else fails there always the Botanics! Where else can you find a few acres of blossoming flowers in central Edinburgh? It was my backstop if I hadn't filled my SD card with butterpics by then. The WoL was generally very lovely, but again no sign of anything fluttering. The Botanics is usually a safe bet for a Red Admiral or 2. Or at least a robin in the Chinese Garden. It was now about 2 o'clock and although I reckoned I had about an hour of useful sunshine left, a quick walk round left me feeling I should just head home pronto. The gardens have really exploded into colour in the last 2 weeks and are very worth a visit. But no butterflies. Always something worth poking the camera at though, and the bees and insects at least hinted that it won't be long before the other flying things return.

no shortage of flowers

I spoke to one of the gardeners. She hadn't seen any butterflies this year, but had seen plenty of bees. She reckoned the most flowery areas would be the alpines and the rock garden. I checked both out then left. I ran back following the WoL downstream to St Mark's park and was just about to head up MacDonald Rd when I remembered I still had the other half of a sandwich and that I should share it with the birds that hang out at another one of these sanctuaries, just above the weir. Below the flat I was working at the other week. (When I looked up to the 4th floor window I could see a big fat pidgey widgey sat on the feeder.)

triffids

bee

fab bike

possibly a little expensive at  €4000+

The goosanders (or common mergansers) were pretty pleased to see me. Or my sandwich, I forget which. The reflections from the flats and trees made patterns and colours on the water, and the best photos of the day. 

14.5 miles over 5hrs