Fast forward to the last week in April 2022 and my wife and I finally arrived in Grazalema, keen to get out and about. But we had arrived after one of the worst early springs in recent history in this part of Spain. The area was waterlogged in many places, a result of recent snow and heavy rainfall, and the butterfly season was running well behind schedule. We spectacularly failed in our hunt for our two target fritillaries, although we did enjoy some fabulous displays of spring Orchids and other wildlife.
Of course, I wasn’t about to give up, so, hoping to avoid an ongoing “Groundhog Day” situation, I once again booked for a repeat attempt this spring, timing our arrival for the end of the first week in May. Surely that would be a good plan, and insure us against the possibility of a repeat late-running season? I monitored the weather out in this part of Spain almost daily from early April, tuning in to the BBC weather app most mornings with a growing sense of trepidation. Temperatures were ridiculously high for the time of year. Seville, Grazalema and Malaga were all seeing figures in the 30s already, and while spring was failing to arrive in the UK it was clear that all the hot weather was stuck in SW Spain, as a prolonged heatwave took hold. I got a report from a friend the week before we were due to arrive out there, saying that he had seen 3 Aetherie Fritillaries in varying states of wear at the main site we were planning to visit. I was beginning to think that we might indeed be too late this year, and the heatwave might just finish the butterflies off before we arrived!
So, with a slightly stomach-churning mix of hope and fear, we landed at Malaga Airport early afternoon on Sunday 7th May, picked up the hire car, and immediately headed north to a location where I very much hoped to find Spanish Fritillaries. This was a beautiful spot, the weather was very warm, and as soon as we got out of the car we were surrounded by excellent numbers of Black-veined Whites, Clouded Yellows, and a few other nice species such as Bath White and Western Dappled White. The first fritillary that we encountered turned out to be a Knapweed Fritillary taking up moisture by one of the very few remaining damp areas, followed by a couple of Provencal Frits.
Ten minutes later my fears of missing out on a new life-tick evaporated into the warm Spanish sunshine as I found myself looking through my camera lens at my first ever Spanish Fritillary. What a beauty! And what a fantastic moment. We saw several more, some well past their best, but some in reasonable condition. Very similar to Marsh Fritillaries, but subtly different, it was a real joy to finally connect with desfontainii!
After a couple of hours, we were feeling the need to get out of the heat and head off to our first hotel of the holiday. We arrived, quite tired, and waited at reception to check in. We were ignored for about ten minutes by several hotel staff, but eventually a rather unfriendly, unwelcoming young girl came and asked for our passports. She then spent another ten minutes looking at them, one-finger typing details into her computer, no communication whatsoever. She finally gave us a key to our room, pointed vaguely in the direction of the lift and went to leave. I asked if we could have two keys – she gave me a look but issued us with a second key before skulking off. Hmmm. Friendly locals then…
Things deteriorated further after we had settled into our room, unpacked the essentials, and gone back down to the “24 hour bar/café” for a drink and some food. Apparently, no food was available until 8pm. We had been up early travelling and just wanted a snack or light bite. Eventually the barmaid conceded that we could have a sandwich. We asked what sort was available. “Chicken. Tuna. Bacon.” I asked for two chicken sandwiches, only to be informed that “It’s green chicken, is that OK?” Now I am pretty catholic when it comes to my taste in food, but green isn’t a colour that I generally go for with chicken, at least not in a sandwich context. I glanced at my wife, she glanced at me. Words were not required. “Er, we’ll have two bacon sandwiches please. Thanks.” “Would you like cheese with that?”. I resisted the temptation to ask what colour the cheese was…
The ”food” duly arrived, we had another celebratory glass of wine, then retired for the night.
Breakfast the following morning was not quite what we expected. No buffet set-up in sight. No fruit, no cereal, no eggs, no pastries. Just another unfriendly waiter, little communication, and a choice of three or four pates, most of which resembled pure lard of coronary artery-clogging density! Plus a glass of orange juice and one piece of toast.
We stopped at the local mini-market on the way up to the Torcal de Antequera to top up on water and edibles. But the day soon took a turn for the better as we encountered our first Spanish Marbled White of the holiday. This was a tertiary target for me after the two main fritillaries, as my previous trips to Andalusia have usually been too early in the year for this species, and I had previously only seen it on one occasion, on a steep hillside where photography was nigh on impossible. It turns out we would see a lot more of this lovely butterfly over the coming days, but photographing the first one was almost as good as getting another lifer!
We did some touristy meandering around the dramatic stone formations of the Torcal, then later in the day headed back for a more extensive look at the Spanish Fritillary site. This time we mooched further afield and found very good numbers of False Baton Blue. In amongst them were smaller numbers of Panoptes Blue – it was very useful to see these two similar species side by side and to enjoy the distinguishing features that separate them. Spanish Gatekeepers were also around, sticking close to their favoured shadier areas around the edge of shrubs and bushes. They really are a cracking little butterfly, my favourite of the three European Gatekeeper species by a long shot!
On Tuesday morning we gratefully left the hotel behind us and began our drive further west towards Grazalema. Here we were to be staying in a wonderful hotel with very friendly and welcoming staff, great food and wine, and stunning views across to the mountains near Grazalema itself, but on the way, we stopped off to search for the main target of the trip, the highly localised and rare Aetherie Fritillary. We knew that they had been flying at this particular location just a few days ago, but despite searching thoroughly for a good four hours, we saw neither hide nor hair of aetherie. This was rather worrying. The area was buzzing with butterflies; many Clouded Yellows, Brimstones, Cleopatras, Black-veined Whites, Small and Southern Small Whites, Green-striped White, Sage Skippers, Small Skippers, Large Wall Browns, Small Coppers and Blue-spot Hairstreaks to name but a few. On the fritillary front, there was just one species flying. Marsh Fritillary. OK, so it wasn’t aetherie, but it was unlike any Marsh Fritillary that I have seen before, as it was the subspecies beckeri, a stunningly red colour form of this butterfly, and not far removed from a Spanish Fritillary in appearance, especially when on the wing. There were a handful flying around and they were nectaring regularly. Real beauties.There was a sense of disappointment as we returned to the hotel that evening that we hadn’t seen our main quarry, but the warm welcome and superb wine and meal at the Hotel Fuerte Grazalema soon made up for it, and after all, we still had a few more days here to continue the search.
On Wednesday we opted to go back for another look at the same site we had failed at yesterday. I got a tip from my friend that his sightings of aetherie had all been in the morning, never after midday, so we set off early in the hope of breaking our duck, arriving shortly after 9am. Little was flying at this early hour, but gradually the same species mix as yesterday came onto the wing. Still no sign of aetherie, and by 12:00 the sense of Groundhog Day had truly descended over us. I made one last sortie up the road, a little further along than I had been previously. I was becoming despondent, but just as I was returning towards car and wife, a very strong candidate for aetherie took to the wing on the opposite road verge. It flew up a gorse-covered slope and straight over a tall wire fence. I was after it like a rat up a drainpipe, vaulting over gorse bushes like a manic teenager on amphetamine! I was stopped by the fence, but I could spot my suspect rested up on a bit of gorse about 15 feet away. I had my Canon dslr/100mm macro combo around my neck at the time so fired off a quick shot, hoping for a record shot if nothing else. I could see immediately that it was indeed an Aetherie Fritillary. A massive life-tick for me! But by the time I had swapped over to my bridge camera with a chance of zooming in, it had flown off. Great excitement, but despite hanging around for a further half hour, the beast didn’t reappear, and eventually we moved on. My wife hadn’t seen it, and I felt a mixture of elation, slightly dampened with disappointment and mild dissatisfaction. It was a brief glimpse, and I had a pants photograph – aetherie was but a small dot in the middle of the image below.
Another fine meal and lovely evening was had at the Hotel Fuerte, watching Griffon Vultures soaring around the mountainsides and valley, and on Thursday I woke with a sense of renewed optimism and hope of better success today. After a superb breakfast we headed off to a more south-westerly location on the edge of the Sierra de Grazalema where we hoped to get up close to aetherie at last. We arrived early once again and the air temperature was low, with a cool breeze blowing around the main search area. Very little was flying. On our drive up to this area we had passed what looked to me like some ideal habitat, slightly lower down and more sheltered from the breeze, so we elected to walk along the Gran Recorrido (GR) path that runs close to the road. As we walked through a mosaic of scrub, small, wooded areas, and more open meadows, it wasn’t long before I spotted a male Aetherie Fritillary at nectar. It was a heart-stopping moment! This male was behaving impeccably and allowed us many photographs, although he was showing some wing damage and signs of wear. A little further down the path I spotted a female scouting around in the vegetation for egg-laying sites. Over the next hour we meandered onwards, finding a total of 15 Aetherie Fritillaries, 9 males and 6 females. Many were very approachable. I was on cloud nine! At last, after all of the planning setbacks, weather setbacks, and general lack of sightings, here I was in the thick of a decent colony of aetherie, with male and female butterflies appearing regularly and allowing great views, not just rapid fly-pasts. Yes, it had been a long time coming, and involved a lot of persistence, but moments like these are rare and precious, and this is a rather special butterfly, instantly obvious on the wing, particularly the male which is so lightly marked with black that it appears distinctly light orange even in flight. There are very few places where you can spend time with Aetherie Fritillaries in Western Europe, and this is a memory that I shall cherish.
Among the other species flying here were several Swallowtails. I am used to seeing feisthalmelii much more often than machaon in Andalusia, but during this holiday machaon seemed to be the commoner of the two.
As you can imagine, Thursday evening was spent in delirious celebration mode! Two lifers in the bag, and Spanish Marbled White photographed at last meant that all three of my targets for this trip had been met. We spent the last couple of days meandering around at leisure, no pressure, just enjoying whatever flew our way! Here is a selection of “also rans”:
Western Dappled White
Spanish Purple Hairstreak
Large Wall Brown
Blue-spot Hairstreak
Cleopatra
Essex Skipper mating pair
Spanish Festoon
I must convey sincere thanks to Dave P and Andy T for much appreciated help and advice. And I must apologise that this report will doubtlessly duplicate some of David’s report from the Greenwings trip – we were in similar territory and even no doubt on the same sites at some points, just separated temporally by a matter of about a week. I now have a wait of a couple of weeks for my next European foray, which will be a “one-species” trip. What the weather will do in the interim is anyone’s guess!
