Slovenia Day 3

On the third day we headed west to a meadow in the Klenik area and then a woodland.

Obviously sightings started to be repeated after a day or so and in particular we got to see so many skippers, meadow browns and marbled whites that we started not to take any notice of them.

However the meadow did produce some new sightings and some better photographs.

In the blues department, Reverdin's blue turned up again and I got a better photo of the eastern short-tailed blue as well as another glamorous entry in the shape of Amanda's blue and a sighting of eastern baton blue.

Amanda's Blue

Eastern Baton Blue

Eastern Short-tailed Blue

Blue Spot Hairstreak

This time you can actually see the short tails!

We started to see some hairstreaks, some thought to be ilex hairstreaks but the ones I saw were blue spot hairstreaks, again a first but one we were to see continuously over the next couple of days.  

The same was true of large chequered blue (see later entries shortly!)

Neither species can be seen in the UK, which sort of makes all the travelling worthwhile.

Fritillaries however proved to be a bit of a problem. My notes indicate that we got to see spotted and twin-spot fritillary but all the photos I got seem to be of marbled fritillary and I think one or two other members of the group had the same experience.

The false heath fritillary is incorrectly named as it is a genuine fritillary, but it often caused as problems as we often confused it with other things.

The other one that turned up was the comma, another that was to reappear several times over succeeding days.

Marbled Fritillary

False Heath Fritillary

Comma

I thought I'd spotted a black-veined white and was a bit surprised to find that it was identified as a clouded apollo.

Clouded Apollo?

I think there remains some doubt over this one...

In the woods for the afternoon session, graylings were a feature as we found both great banded grayling on the way  and woodland grayling, plus I happened on a straightforward, everyday grayling in the village where we got out of the van - so graylings galore...  Also conspicuous (partly for their amorous behaviour) were a could of alpine longhorn beetles, much to the delight of the group leader Terry who has been hoping to see one for years!

Great Banded Grayling	Woodland Grayling
Grayling	Alpine Longhorn Beetle

Through the day I noticed (and was able to identify) a a couple of moths, namely latticed heath and golden yellow wave.

Golden Yellow Wave

Latticed Heath

Bugwise we also had - apart from more damselflies - a big rose chafer and a red bug whose exact name I have forgotten.

Big Rose Chafer

Red Beetle

Less auspicious sights were a snake swimming across a river and our leader wading through a huge puddle to capture a yellow-bellied toad.

Slovenia - Day 1

Another year, another summer so obviously time for another butterfly holiday, this time to Slovenia with Greenwings  which is where I was last week.

By way of a prelude, I think all the group I was with were impressed with the cleanliness and friendliness of Slovenia.  Although a small country, it contains large tracts of natural countryside attractive to those of many forms of wildlife.  The locations we visited were in the West and North West of Slovenia.

Day 1

The first few days were spent near the town of Rakov.  We got in a reasonable session  at a meadow near our hotel but the rains came down while looking round a second area by the River Reka, so we ended up settling for a birdwatching session near a farm.

It wasn't all about butterflies anyway.  By the river there were numerous damselflies, of which the banded demoiselle tends to catch the attention.

Banded Demoiselle

White-legged Damselfly

On the pm birdwatch, a good number of species turned up, including whinchat, white crane, fieldfare, spotted flycatcher, tree sparrow, and black redstart.  Awaiting eye test, I didn't manage to photograph all that was seen.

Spotted Flycatcher

Black Redstart

Fieldfare

Tree Sparrows

We scored well on butterflies in the first field, but not so well by the river, which at the time we attributed to deteriorating weather conditions.  As often the case on my nature trips abroad, there are so many I made them into a short video, including a couple of moths:

I hope I haven't misidentified anything.  My notes suggest we also saw marbled and twin spot fritillaries.

A couple of specimens I struggled with were one bee I couldn't get anywhere with - possibly some sort of mining bee but could be a lot of things - and this cricket that could perhaps be a dark bush cricket.

Mining Bee?

Dark Bush Crcket?