2018 October 19

 

   Jeremy Tatum writes:  Yesterday I showed a photograph of a lycaenid caterpillar photographed by Nathan Fisk on Beach Knotweed – a common foodplant of the Purplish Copper.    I cautioned, however, that the caterpillar more closely resembled that of a Grey Hairstreak.   I am now wholly convinced that it is indeed a Grey Hairstreak, and I have now labelled it as such.  Here is an enlargement of a second photograph by Nathan of the caterpillar.   On comparison with my photograph of a Grey Hairstreak caterpillar at    facweb.furman.edu/~snyderjohn/tatum/098-101.htm     there can now be little doubt of the identity.

 

Grey Hairstreak Strymon melinus (Lep.: Lycaenidae)   Nathan Fisk

 

   Jeremy Tatum writes:  One Cabbage White, Martindale Road, this afternoon.  Also a big, brightly-coloured moth flew past me, almost colliding with my head.  I believe it was probably a Garden Tiger Arctia caja.