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31/07/2021-Brilliant day of butterflies, birds, flowers and more at Durlston: Part 1 of 2

We did another of our planned July further afield trips today, a second visit to Durlston this year after the usual April seabird and spring flower dominated one to try and see a Lulworth Skipper. On the way here it was great to take in many lovely sights such as lots of hemp agronomy, some fuchsia, the epic Corfe Castle which I took the first picture in this photoset of and a happy feeling Swanage nearby with many holidaymakers around. It was interesting to see that the distinct patches of in flower gorse on a hill I noticed driving in last time were dark green now.

At Durlston it did feel so nice coming twice in a year. In 2019 we had information from a kind person we met at Bentley Wood in the June that Lulworth Skippers could be seen here so we did the second visit after seeing hundreds of Wall Browns alongside birds and flowers in the April and I was so thrilled by how many Lulworth Skippers we saw that July a key moment in what is still probably my greatest year of butterflies if I had to chose seeing more species that year than in any other that I thought this should become an annual July jaunt a good time to see the Lulworth Skippers like Knepp is for Purple Emperors and other butterflies and Durlston would become a twice a year thing. But last year with us locked down in April we luckily managed to combine the summer and spring visit in our June week off of day trips once restrictions eased with the butterflies all coming out earlier last year.

Straight away today we walked along in the glorious meadows full of varied and rich flower life and beautiful grass. We saw some fantastic flowers walking through here including centaury which I learnt a few weeks ago at Lymington another coastal area, probably cat’s-ear which I took the fourth picture in this photoset of, corky-fruited water-dropwort which I took the eighth picture in this photoset of, red bartsia, bird’s-foot trefoil, white and broad-leaved clover, small scabious, knapweed, notably big bright pink bits of thistle woolly thistle, self-heal, agrimony, dock, honeysuckle, carrot, wild parsnip, ragwort, speedwell and late pyramidal orchid which was brilliant to see. 

And hosted within the meadows were a wealth of butterflies. I did what was probably my first Big Butterfly Count outside of Hampshire since being here two years ago this week. Within the counting I saw one Red Admiral, eight Marbled Whites lovely to see these that are coming to their end at home a great few out of these one of my favourite butterflies here still, one Painted Lady, eleven Gatekeepers leading the way we saw their sweet orange glow and markings so much this afternoon, five Meadow Brown, one Speckled Wood, three Small White, two Six Spot Burnet moth, one Common Blue, one Small Copper and one Ringlet. This was a brilliant count, one of my highest yielding in the two of the three weeks of counting so far this year for me and one of my biggest variety of species. It felt so good to help document these here today and was just so rewarding to see so many. Seeing Small Copper and Painted Lady was great and left few of the Big Butterfly Count target species that I haven’t seen on a count yet this year. I hadn’t seen either for a little while as well so it was great to see as Common Blues continued to come back into my year after seeing them at Lakeside yesterday. It was ten years ago yesterday that I had the day I still remember so well instantly recognising it as a butterfly I’d seen in the book we have on a typical for us walk of 2011 at Godshill in the New Forest seeing my first ever Small Copper and feeling it was something so exotic probably my most exciting butterfkt of that year. I made this Tumblr around that time as the anniversary post I did earlier shows so it was very fitting to see Small Coppers again today. I took the fifth picture in this photoset of one.

And as we walked around here I was so excited that we saw our targets. Firstly my Mum called me over as I was lagging behind and she had two butterflies she thought were Wall Browns behind a fence. Being very much like Small Copper a butterfly I have identified and known a lot since we first got into butterflies I came and had a look and with one settled saw it was a Wall Brown. I was over the moon to see this special dry brown butterfly looking smashing. It was the big milestone in my butterfly year, something I had described as the promised land before in a butterfly year for me my 40th butterfly species I’ve seen this year. And this one felt special as it always does one of my favourite butterflies but also because after them being something I’d only seen in Pembrokeshire before since 2016 we have seen them every year on the Dorset and even Hampshire coast seeing them in Cornwall, Norfolk and Northumberland the past two years too and this year it was the longest wait we’d had to see one in a year since 2016. They’re never a guarantee in a year for us so this was a huge relief of a butterfly to get seen this year. And at this site which has excelled for them for us in the past we saw a very healthy handful of them dancing along walls and long grass this afternoon.

Moving on and our search for the Lulworth Skipper now stepped up, with the sun still out and it pretty warm with potential for further showers in the day we wanted to seize our chance in the meadows with the sun out which were swaying in the wind a bit too. Then all of a sudden coming through a gate into a field we spotted a little orange spec gliding through the grass. Our first skipper today, it looked small enough (compared to the familiar Small Skipper) for the Lulworth and when it settled it opened its wings revealing the gorgeous and distinctive lighter orange crescent on the wing of the female Lulworth Skipper!

We had seen this golden gem of a rare butterfly. I was so overjoyed to get precious moments with this monumental species in another fantastic year of butterflies for us trying for photos with my macro lens I managed the sixth picture in this photoset of it which shows it nicely really getting stuck into the flower. We saw a few more further on in the walk and coming back through the same area too. They were sensational to see it made me so happy. And it takes my butterfly year list up to very high places for me personally. Now 2021 is outright my fourth highest ever butterfly year list only one behind the amount I saw in 2018. And on this date in my previous years only in my highest ever butterfly year list 2019 had I seen more at this stage. I am so proud of this as I said butterfly species could have easily been missed this year in the changeable weather but we’ve persevered and these past few weeks it’s been brilliant to feel like putting the icing on the cake of another epic and characteristic butterfly year with the exciting high summer species and big moments with so many species and individuals about. As we did at another point of the walk we met some lovely people when looking at the Lulworth Skipper and had a great chat often a key part of the enjoyment of big days out in years like these.

Walking around Durlston a very special place for us today we took in the stunning views of the wonderful mixture of cliffs, sea and meadows seeing into Poole Harbour nicely too with some smashing dramatic sky scenes above the ocean and land too making for unique views for us here. I also took the second, third and seventh pictures in this photoset of beautiful views here today. What a beautiful place my favourite type of area this type of coast. We saw as we did on this trip in 2019 some pretty Roe Deers skulking around in the long grass we got some very special views of these lovely mammals today I tweeted a picture of these on Dans_Pictures tonight. We got smashing views of one of our star birds of this place especially three of the last four visits earlier this year going to Dancing Ledge too, last year’s and April 2019 the Whitethroat today a really rich looking warbler that after another great year for I made the most of having this migrant around. After any threat of showers were held off for a long time when out today making us pleased we came today there were some menacing clouds that didn’t materialize as we sat down giving Missy our dog a rest from the walking. I took the ninth picture in this photoset of the lovely light cloud I’ve enjoyed so much this year here. 

At this point it became a top day of birds too with some Shags seen flying low over the sea water below the cliff as we took in splendid panoramic views with some nice sunlight over the water as we’ve seen well here before making it shine. There was another Wall Brown along a wall and top Stonechat views a bird I first ever saw at this reserve in 2007 and the Stonechat tried to catch the Wall Brown at one point which was interesting. Ravens dashed astonishingly  right over our heads barking loudly as they went, amazing views of this crow so strong a coastal sight. We saw one later on too going over our head fantastically again. Swifts glided perfectly over too another migratory bird I made the most of today in a strong year for them. Sat here without a care in the world, with all we needed for that moment, we had achieved an in invigorating sense of peace and happiness. A special moment of reflection and delight on this one of my days of the year. We saw two great flowers sat on the ground here too, ironiclly as we were resting my second ever restharrow after some at Stockbridge Down last summer and some cut looking mother of thyme.