June 2018 - part 3
21st June 2018 - (Thursday, Csütörtök)
22nd June 2018 - (Friday, Péntek)
The big thunderstorm in the early hours of this morning brought little rain to the Small Quarry. The Bowl water level was a little more, but nothing dramatic. Later, I checked the whole of the airfield road by car, right up to the airfield. The bushes had been cut back right up to the airfield, but no drainage channels had been cut, so it must just be the dry ground soaking up the rain water, as we suspected.
25th June 2018 - (Monday, Hétfő)
It was a rather dull, cool, and cloudy day with a few rain spots about. This gave the impression that we wouldn't see much on our afternoon visit, but, nothing could be further from the truth! We even recorded two new moth species for the site!
28th June 2018 - (Thursday, Csütörtök)
29th June 2018 - (Friday, Péntek)
Not photographed: Great Banded Grayling, Eastern Pale Clouded Yellow. Golden Oriole and Cuckoo heard.
30th June 2018 - (Saturday, Szombat)
A much hotter day than I'd envisaged as the area was being buffeted by very strong gusts of wind. As usual, this made insect photgraphy very awkward, but I managed ... mostly ! The highlight of the day was discovering a single Valesina among the 'normal' Silver-washed Fritillaries. I saw about 10 of these 'normals'. I was so excitied by the Valesina that I didn't even notice the White-letter Hairstreak lurking on the same flower head ! Butterflies seen but not photographed were: Eastern Pale Clouded Yeloow and Wood White. Although most of the Shrub Elder in the sunny areas is past the flowering stage and berries have started to form, other plants in shady areas are only just starting to flower, so these should keep the Silver-washed Fritillaries happy in the next few days. A young boy called Bálint came down from the top rim, scrambled down past the HQ and cut through the reedbed before marching past me. We exchanged greetings in Hungarian. He seemed to have family at one of the houses, and I wonder if it was he who pulled the Paper Wasp nest out of the HQ doorbell housing, and left the flap wide open (discovered yesterday).