The following day we went for a walk around Salines de la Mata, which is a nature reserve around a saline lake. To entice the kids I offered a Euro to the first person to spot a butterfly and within a few feet of the car park my son and daughter were arguing over who had seen the wall brown first. I had to give them both a Euro and tell them there was another Euro for the next butterfly! Very quickly Jemma had earned her Euro with a swallowtail. Robbie soon countered that with a red squirrel, so I had to pay out on that too! It was worth the four Euros to get them interested, though!
- Again on maximum zoom!
On the rest of the walk we saw a further two wall browns and six small whites and on the way back to the car a Bath white, but it didn’t stop for a picture.
Having decided that the coast was possibly a little too dry I thought that I would travel inland a little the following day. I intended to try to reach some distant hills, but a combination of factors, mostly me getting lost, prevented me getting that far. In the end I settled for a reservoir – Embarrassment de la Pedrera. Eventually, I found an area where I could walk as much of the area was fenced off with “Private” signs. It seems that the locals used this area for clay pigeon shooting and dumping old television sets and initially it seemed that it didn’t offer much for butterflies. However, after about 15 minutes I saw a couple of Spanish marbled whites squabbling over a sunny spot. Every time one landed the other flew over and chased it away and I spent ages trying to get a photo. Eventually, I realised that if I just stayed at this favoured spot with my camera ready one of them would fly into view. And sure enough it worked!
Having spent some time in this small area the butterflies suddenly started to appear. It was about midday, but I had imagined that earlier in the day would have been just as good. Over the next hour I saw several small whites, bath whites, black-eyed blues, several more Spanish marbled whites, three painted ladies a swallowtail, wall and a clouded yellow. They were all very active and didn’t really present any good photo opportunities, but it was good to see reasonable numbers of butterflies at last. At one point I got the fright of my life as a lizard that must have been almost two feel long broke cover in front of me. I could hear it footsteps as it ran along the track ahead of me!
The Bath whites were real torments! They rarely stopped for any length of time and proved very difficult to photograph. These were the best two shots I managed. Later in the holiday I had one perfectly framed in my camera and when I pressed the button I realised it was on video.
- This one appears to be laying an egg.
On the final day of our holiday I went back to Salinas De La Mata in the afternoon to see if there were any more butterflies around. Unfortunately I only saw only one wall and a swallowtail and a brief glimpse of a red admiral.
So, only 13 species for the trip, along with a few fleeting glances of a few unidentified butterflies.
Geranium bronze
Painted lady
Small white
Large white
Swallowtail
Clouded yellow
Scarce swallowtail
Specked wood
Black-eyed blue
Bath white
Wall
Spanish marbled white
Red admiral
As a small consolation, when we returned home on a cool grey day I saw that a small white had emerged from one of the chrysalises on the house. It was too cold for it to fly and it was still there this morning until the sun made an appearance.
