Silver Washed Fritillary on Hemp Agrimony Mine is a sylvan quest through a heat-wave in July. Deep shadows of the woodland fringe are the habitat of the Silver Washed Fritillary. On butterfly watch, we linger over flowers until the Silver Washed Fritillary flies from the shadows on wings of bright gold. When temperatures soared I fell in love with sylvan fragrances, with cool shadow and sunlit glade, and a woodland flora on the spring-line where water mint grows,
Leaving the wood, I’m in suspense. Until I’m home, until I have the day’s images on screen. Until I look closely, I do not know what my camera has seen. And there are surprises.
A trio of dancing butterflies out of the shadows, over bramble flowers, close, yet elusive. 'Take the shot,' urges M in the Bond movie, Skyfall. Miss Moneypenny hesitates, she can't get a clear shot. Nor can I, but I go for it. We wait for them to return but they do not. A trio of Silver Washed Fritillary and I have them on camera. Are they flying off? Or hydrating on damp mud, sipping minerals which the males need to make pheromones to attract females
A trio of dancing butterflies out of the shadows, over bramble flowers, close, yet elusive. 'Take the shot,' urges M in the Bond movie, Skyfall. Miss Moneypenny hesitates, she can't get a clear shot. Nor can I, but I go for it. We wait for them to return but they do not. A trio of Silver Washed Fritillary and I have them on camera. Are they flying off? Or hydrating on damp mud, sipping minerals which the males need to make pheromones to attract females
A sequence of images shows a red soldier beetle climbing a stem of hemp agrimony to settle on flowers below the butterfly. Something else I did not see at the time.
My cache of images, my Silver Washed Fritillary of the day, represents interludes of intense focus. Here I pin my hopes but the sylvan experience is richer and deeper. So I share the aesthetic of sylvan, of being in high-summer woodland, searching a drift of hemp agrimony for an elusive butterfly deep in flowers. The Silver Washed Fritillary is a butterfly of the woodland fringe, an enchantment where sunlight and shadows meet.
My cache of images, my Silver Washed Fritillary of the day, represents interludes of intense focus. Here I pin my hopes but the sylvan experience is richer and deeper. So I share the aesthetic of sylvan, of being in high-summer woodland, searching a drift of hemp agrimony for an elusive butterfly deep in flowers. The Silver Washed Fritillary is a butterfly of the woodland fringe, an enchantment where sunlight and shadows meet.
So, I give you sylvan, a high-summer woodland, with butterflies far off and near. As You Like It, for this might be The Forest of Arden- a magical, enchanted place, romanticized even as Shakespeare imagined it in his drama. Romanticized once more in a Cumbrian woodland.
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