Tench and Butterflies.

 

 Went tench fishing, weather was crud and I blanked, I blame the weather.

 On to Butterflies....saw a few on my recent visits but most notable was the Small Pearl Bordered Fritillary which are pretty rare and missed out on them last year, so this year I was chuffed to see them and a mating pair to boot made it into the photo reel, species number 53 ✅. The remainder now require long distances to check off but with diesel now around £2.00 per LITRE! I am now thinking twice about any journey made in the car as its bloody expensive, regardless of financial standings, most are feeling it....

Side on SPBF.

Mating SPBF's!

Lightning quick Wall Brown.

It's Been a Tough Spring.

  I can almost count the amount of fish caught this closed season on two hands its been that tough, I hoped with more stable and favourable Tench weather that I'd really get amongst them in the numbers that I'm used to.

 To begin with things were slow going and considering the bottom was being ripped up in sections of the lake I was expecting action fairly quickly, unfortunately this didn't happen right away and had to wait a good a hour or two before the first Tinca slipped up. A good solid fight as usual ensued, with most of it under the rod tip I was always within touching distance. Once its resolve was broken I slipped a lovely mint conditioned Tench into the net. A pleasing 6lb 3oz on the scales and what I hoped to be the beginning of a catching spell.

Also when netting that Tench a Smooth/Common Newt was in the folds of my net, rolled up in the clay!

 But, much befitting for the last 3 months of fishing I only got the odd knock and a couple of missed bites on the float, man this has been tough going. So around 11am I decided to give it a break and head off to do some walking in the forest to get some exercise. With the camera in hand I also got some great shots (improvements on last years attempts.

Wood White

Male Adonis Blue

Female Adonis Blue

 After a 4 hour rest I got back to the Tench fishing and annoyingly I could see numerous fish moving around in the upper layers of the water column and wasn't until later on in the day and observing was glaringly obvious that the Tench were beginning to group and no doubt spawning was firmly on their minds in the coming days. So for me the Tench fishing is over before it had barely begun! 

 I AM FIRMLY LOOKING FORWARD TO THE RIVERS OPENING UP! 

 It has been diabolical and thats putting it mildly, lets hope that fortunes improve and I can get off to flying start on the double figure Barbel challenge where I begin the season on 5 rivers.

Thames, Wandle, Sussex Ouse, Hampshire Avon and Trent currently ticked off my list, if I can get up to 10+ by the end of this season I will be ecstatic to say the least. Fingers and toes crossed.

Slightly off Topic.

 It's no secret that I have enjoyed the miniature beasts hunting since last April and I have continued from where I left off. Wanting to photograph Adders, Common Lizards and keep adding to my Butterfly count which will hopefully culminate in collecting images of all 59 of the British Isles species.

 I began on 45 species and have since added to that total with the successful tracking down of the "Pearl Boarded Fritillary". It is now time to get a Marsh Fritillary ( Battlesbury in Wiltshire) and Small Pearl Boarded Fritillary ( Park Corner Heath ), plus a better shot of a "Wall", then calculate emergences of different species with fishing trips to kill two birds with some one stone.

 Large Heath is Lancashire, Large Blue in the SW, Swallowtail in Norfolk, Large Tortoiseshell in Portland along with the Lulworth Skipper, Black Hairstreak on Epsom Common, then it really starts to get serious in terms of travel.

 4 species can only be found up in Scotland and requires a large slice of luck with the weather when making the journey up, but that will be for another time. 

 Here are some images of the "PBF" and some other butterflies and Lizards/Snakes.

A male and female Orange Tip.

Green Hairstreak.

Freshly emerged Small Blue.

Dingy Skipper.

Female Orange Tip.

Glanville Fritillary.

Pearl Boarded Fritillary. Species no:46.

Duke of Burgundy with abberation.

Grizzled Skipper.

Common Lizard posing for me.

Morning Adder warming up.