www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

Thank you for the compliment Matsukaze. I have only been to Somerset once, a few years ago, but I recall pretty villages and lovely countryside. It would be good to return. I have looked at that link and I'm very tempted to give it a go. Let me know how you get on with your trees.

I think I am suffering with a mild case of OCD. I can't get enough of these cats and I'm very aware that before too much longer it will all be over, so I have to make the most of it. That said, a few more shots, this time of No. 6 as his camouflage is incredible:
In the meantime, No. 3 (below) is turning more of an olive green, and No 2 is persisting in his attempts to pupate in inappropriate places. I have provided him with some damp compost with Elm branches in it and he has promptly buried himself in it - before I could get any sort of decent photo - very much following the trend of No.1.

I am really interested in the various transitions that take place during the life cycle, so if I am able to see and record these as I rear a particular species it is a real bonus. The emergence of the butterfly is really magical and the novelty has not yet worn off so having reared the caterpillar I confess that I do spend some time trying to witness this particular event (and get a few shots ). I am anticipating a few difficulties trying to capture any WLH emergence on camera as both No. 2 and No. 3 have decided to pupate under the soil despite my efforts to encourage them to pupate somewhere more accessible. I have looked in various books including Frohawk and Margaret Brooks and they all state that WLH pupate on leaves and buds (but then they also state that WLH have no cannibalistic propensities and I have heard differently from folk on this website!). Anyway, this is No. 3, successfully thwarting my efforts to persuade him to pupate on a branch. I found him this morning 'buried' in the oasis - similar to No's 1& 2:
We went through several iterations of me coaxing him onto branch and and him taking some time to humour me, before returning to the compost I had supplied:
It was very interesting watching him dig a hole and move the soil around, a process also repeated several times, as though he was just searching for the right place, before he disappeared completely:
So now I only have No's 4 and 6 available for viewing - here is No 4 looking great as usual. I am going to do my utmost to ensure that he pupates above ground:

Some cracking close up work Pauline Good luck keeping the little blighters above ground!

Have a goodun

Wurzel

Hi Pauline
Great views of the development of these larvae .
At least 2 of mine have survived the stormy weather of Sunday night. It seems quite incredible that mine are still only a couple of millimetres long, about the size of your No1 at the beginning of March, second instar I would say. If development of my larvae continues at the same rate they will be pupating a month after yours

Thank you Wurzel - I think I might have to get a bit resourceful cos they can be quite determined and persistent when they want to do something

Thank you too Paul. I hope your 3rd cat is still around somewhere and that they make it through. I am not surprised they are still very tiny as I don't imagine they have eaten much given the recent weather. However, they are probably much more in line with the wild cats that manage to survive. It will be interesting to make comparisons with the cats Jamie is hoping to monitor as they are 'totally' wild.

Today I decided to transfer my Glanville cats to a fresh plant. The original plant was a bit past its best and it would also give me an opportunity to have a good look at the cats and check their numbers. I had originally counted 17 Glanvilles but I have been reluctant to remove the mesh to verify the number as they are real escape artists. However, over the past week or so I have never been able to count more than about a dozen, mostly on the inside of the mesh. The plant has a dense middle where the cats had made a web and any cats in this area would not be visible so I was not initially unduly concerned. However, as the days went by I became increasingly uneasy as I was only able to count about 8 cats so it was high time to find out what was going on. I should by now have learned to trust my gut instinct. When I fear there may be a problem, (and I do try to monitor them closely but without too much disturbance) there almost always is . The first thing I noticed was what appeared to be shed skins lying on the soil but I am now fairly convinced that these are dead cats:
I removed 9 active cats and placed them in a tub prior to carefully dissecting the plant leaf by leaf. There were no more cats!! I then started on the soil. As I carefully sifted through the top layer a couple of insects scurried out and I was able to trap one. I have taken a few shots which are not very good as it continued to move very quickly but I hope they are clear enough to enable someone to identify it and confirm it is the culprit.

Hi! Pauline, your Cats are doing what comes naturally to them by the sounds of things (burying themselves in compost you may have a problem there trying to get them not too. Goldie

Thing is Goldie, everything I've read indicates that these cats pupate on buds and leaves, but apart from No. 1 (who initially tried to pupate in the oasis) it looks like all the others want to pupate in soil/leaf litter so it is clearly not a one off. Anyway, you were absolutely right about No. 4 as I have spent most of the morning trying to persuade him to pupate somewhere on a twig - with absolutely no success !!! He eventually wore me down and I gave in. I tried to tempt him by offering different thickness of branches at different angles, in different states of development (including my potted Elm which is now in leaf), in different temperatures and he rejected them all I tried everything I could think of for some hours but it was not what he wanted. As soon as I provided some leaf litter he settled down to pupate. Here are some shots from my futile attempts over the last 2 days:
It is a while since I posted shots of No 6 so an update on his development below starting with yesterday:
... and today:
Thankfully, my White Admiral cat survived storm Katie although he is not as active as my WA cat was at this time last year:

I've been out a bit - Bentley Wood, Chiddingfold Forest, Oxenbourne and a few other places and so far I've seen 2 Brimstone!!! Can't remember such a poor start to my season so it was something of a relief to find 36 moths in the trap last night - at last, something with wings! I didn't have time to photograph and ID all of them so just picked out the ones I liked best. Hopeless at ID's so I hope someone can confirm or otherwise:
Oak Beauty
Early Grey
Common Quaker
Twin-spotted Quaker
Hebrew Character
Hebrew Character
Yellow Horned (like these ones )
Yellow Horned
Common Quaker? (so much colour variation!)
Hebrew Character
Clouded Drab (amazing camouflage)
Clouded Drab
Clouded Drab
Don't Know
Clouded Drab
Can't remember!

It has been suggested to me that the creatures I found in the pot with my Glanvilles might have been larva of Leather Jackets. I had always thought these were quite large (aren't these what Badgers dig up lawns for?) but looking at photos on the internet I found some that were remarkably similar to the ones I removed. Since then I have been a little bit paranoid about the well-being of my cats counting them at least hourly . Today I can report that there are still 9 but there are a few that definitely don't seem to be thriving and they are causing me some concern. I have been advised that compost (even organic compost) has a systemic insecticide added to it (in line with EU regs!) and I wondered if anyone else has experienced problems when using it to pot plants for rearing. Some months ago, before I was aware of this, I had a conversation with a garden centre about their compost and they assured me that it would definitely not contain any pests or eggs but they did not elaborate. At the time I wondered how they could be so sure but perhaps it is because it has had this added. Anyway, a few long overdue shots of the developing Glanvilles:
This one doesn't look so good to my inexperienced eye:
.... and although this is a dreadful shot it shows the relative difference in size, despite being exposed to identical conditions:

Some of your smaller Glanvilles are still a skin change behind the biggest, I still have some tiny ones amongst mine, but the others have doubled their size in the last 3 days, and some of them are about to change again for the 7th and last instar.

Our Local amenity site has free compost, that croydon residents can take 3 bags a day, as it is safe to use I have been using it for about a year now, the quality is not as good with the odd twig in it, but it can also be mixed with other soil.

The Seed and cutting compost is also safe to use, but its the compost for bigger plants that has been treated.

Some cracking Moth shots Pauline it seems that everyone is turning to the dark side

Have a goodun

Wurzel

Pauline wrote:I wondered if anyone else has experienced problems when using it to pot plants for rearing.

Nope - never.

Cheers,

- Pete

Hi Pauline,

I'm a bit jealous of your moth catch, particularly the Yellow Horned I am still waiting for a decent mothing night here, since I have had my trap it has been either clear skies and cold or when it has clouded over it has been windy and wet. Still, I haven't had a blank night yet when I have run the trap, usually a mixture of Hebrew Characters and Common Quakers with a few Clouded Drabs and a single Oak Beauty so far.

I am just a beginner at this moth identification game and am prepared to be corrected but I reckon that your third photo down is a Clouded Drab and your 'Don't Know' is a Common Quaker. Having these two in my trap recently has had looking at lots of reference photos of these and given me an appreciation of how variable they can be..

All the best,

Neil

Pauline wrote:I wondered if anyone else has experienced problems when using it to pot plants for rearing.

I have had problems in the past with various compost.

compost from various cheap shops, had been treated with Intercept, so i lost some pupating Death's Head Hawks, this was in 1997 when intercept was first used, various horticulture establishments still mix it into the compost, so plants from those need to be left outside for months. The larvae tend to live fine for a few weeks then die as it builds up as they eat leaves, eggs tend not to hatch if laid on treated plants.

Thank you Martin and Pete for that information and re-assurance. I will continue to monitor the Glanvilles closely.

Cheers Wurzel - I think there is a little bit of desperation here given the weather and lack of butterflies but it is interesting to learn what is about at night ...... and in a few weeks time it will be almost Summer

I appreciate those ID's Neil given that I am very much a beginner too. Those Yellow Horned are smashing aren't they but I see now I only posted profile shots, so a different angle below. I'd really like to get the trap out more often but it can sometimes be quite time consuming:
Probably the final update on the WLH until emergence is imminent. This is No. 6 over his final couple of days as a cat. I have successfully thwarted his persistent attempts to pupate in the compost, eventually managing to divert him to a branch where he now seems to be quite settled, a gorgeous olive green colour:
Meanwhile, because of my concern about the compost and the possible risk to the WLH pupating there, I have carefully extracted them, so this is the current state of No's 1, 2, 3 and 4 in that order:

Given the recent loss of some of the Glanvilles I have been watching them incredibly closely. Two of the nine have been causing me some concern as they are quite tiny and the size difference between them and some of the bigger cats is quite significant. I was therefore quite shocked this morning when I saw one of the larger cats ‘interacting’ with the tiniest one whilst it was attempting to eat. It nudged the little cat onto its side and proceeded to climb onto it. I genuinely thought it meant the little cat some serious harm and at one point it looked as if it was trying to eat it. My first instinct was to ‘rescue’ it but curiosity had gotten the better of me and I wondered if this was how some of the other tiny cats had died. Instead I reached for the camera. Unfortunately all of the shots are actually taken through the mesh so they lack some clarity and sharpness but I hope they give an indication of events. If I had tried to remove the mesh it is likely that at least half a dozen cats would have dropped down and quite probably would have interrupted the behaviour I was so keen to witness.

The large cat persisted in climbing around and over the little cat, spending several moments at a time with his head on the little one’s back or with both heads touching, frequently nudging him. A couple of times I thought he had killed this little one which remained on its side motionless and it seemed the larger cat was about to depart. However, he never went far, always returning to circle and climb over the little one. As I watched the large cat positioned himself to the side of the little cat and stretched over him to the far side of the leaf, which he touched with his head and then moved his head back over to the near side and touched the leaf. He did this repeatedly and it eventually dawned on me that he was producing some sort of silken thread which he seemed to be using to wrap up the little cat – in the same way that a spider wraps up its prey, or similar to constructing a girdle for support during pupation. I searched for other possible reasons – it was like he was anointing the little cat in some way, or perhaps he was trying to create some sort of web to protect the little cat. Perhaps he was trying to encourage it to shed its skin!

This behaviour went on for some 15 minutes after which the large cat left and the little one remained slightly ‘trussed up’. All sorts of thoughts went through my head as I wasn’t sure the little cat was alive and even if he was I wasn’t sure whether he could move – perhaps the large cat would return later for a meal (although they have no cannibalistic tendencies, apparently). Thankfully, after a few minutes the little cat started to wriggle about and was able to free himself and continue to eat. 10 minutes after this he was sprawled out on his leaf with two of the others so I assume all is well but I have no idea what this behaviour was all about. I hope I have been able to portray it adequately and if anyone has a potential explanation I would be very interested in any theories.

Glanvilles are gregarious and have no cannibalistic tendencies. In fact, quite the opposite; a group can raise their body temperature, collectively, more than a single individual could - and this raise in temperature helps them digest their food. As a collective, they will crawl over each other to get the best position for warming up - just as Marsh Fritillary do. At least, that's my experience. As the larvae grow, they will start to disperse.

In a given web of larvae, there will always be some stragglers, so I wouldn't be overly worried based on size. I would be more worried if you were finding larvae that were diseased.

Cheers,

- Pete

Here is a picture of mine taken at around 7pm, they were spread out all afternoon but have grouped for the night. I have seen larvae knock others off the web so they can take the position, one problem with rolling up and dropping off, they loose their prime spot.

Thank you for this information Pete and for your reassurances - I do appreciate it but I still have some concerns. At the moment I am watching and waiting before I go into more detail and end up looking quite stupid

Great photos Martin. It is interesting to hear about your experiences with the Glanvilles, especially the fact that you have seen them spinning over each other. However, you already know the issues I have some doubts about and I shall obviously keep you informed.

Yesterday, I decided to pay a brief visit to Noar Hill but as I arrived the heavens opened and all the parking areas were either flooded or thick of mud . I turned around and came home. Going a bit stir crazy with this weather (it is raining again) so altho' I wasn't going to post any more WLH just yet this is an update from today.
No. 1
No. 2
No. 3
No. 4
No. 4 - a different view
No. 6

Pauline,

Some great stuff here, analysis & pictures. Just wish I had the time, patience and inclination. Keep up the good work and look forward to seeing the reward for your efforts.

Andy