Cycling slowly down cycle track 14, I kept a look out for places where there might be butterflies. At first all I encountered was a grey wagtail and a few speckled wood. Then right at the bottom end of the Derwent just west of the confluence of the Tyne (and very near the edge of the industrial estate) I found a flower meadow.
Here the results were very similar to those encountered at Blaydon just over a week previously - plenty of meadow brown and small skippers, several burnet moths and common blues and a few ringlet. I had a suspicion that one or two of the skippers might be large skippers but the suspect I checked was a small.
On the way back I saw a female roe deer with two foals drinking at the riverside. They had a very reddish look and at first I thought they were red deer. Research however shows that there are no red deer in the area.
The session was nicely capped off when I got off the bike at home to see a small tortoiseshell on the wee buddleia in the front garden. There were three more sightings later on in the day.
Small Tortoiseshell
In the evening, I decided to go to Waldridge Fell in search of purple hairstreaks, my current number one target. I did see three seperate willow warblers and after a longish period of staring at various oak trees, of which there are many, I did on four occasions see some buitterflies circling the oak crowns.
Unfortunately they were all speckled woods!
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