After the overnight rain Butterflies were very abundant over the downland today with many species at numbers not seen for some time. Small Skippers were particularly numerous.
It was particularly pleasing to see my first Silver Spotted Skippers of the year and there were reasonable numbers of them already. The first sighting in Sussex for this species this year was only 6 days ago but without trying too hard at least 30 were seen today.
With this fresh female it wasn't long before an admiring male was trying to pair up with her flying closely by her and fluttering his wings to send his scent scales over her. He then attempted to clamp onto her to pair up. At this he was unsuccessful though!!
The session finished off with a very smart Brown Argus.
