Butterflies on the menu

Butterflies, dragonflies and high key pictures. Those are my three goals this summer.

I started to work a little with high key pictures during the workshop in Bulgaria. Hopefully you haven’t missed that the photo album from Bulgaria is up. I got the first taste of both butterflies and dragonflies in Bulgaria which was great. Now I have started to look for a good habitat for the Common Yellow Swallowtail back home.

My knowledge of butterflies and their habitat is more or less zero. That is why I use Artportalen to look for sightings of them. This morning I found records of adult Swallowtails that recently had been seen in the archipelago of Gothenburg. This meant I had to give it a try this Sunday.

Looking for the Swallowtail

As far as I know Swallowtails is decreasing due to habitat loss. They like to lay their eggs upon the upper leaves of the milk parsley plant and the supply of milk parsley decreases.

It was first when I got there that I understood why the Swallowtail seems to thrive on this small island. Firstly, the area in which I found them was not easily accessible and therefore left for its own by most humans. Secondly, I found wet parts in which milk parsley stood meaning they had plants to lay their eggs upon. So all in all good habitat for them.

I saw two adults at same time and I would guess there must be a couple of more. It was sadly windy, but I got a couple of pictures of the Swallowtail when it was resting, sunning.

I actually thought I would have a hard time getting pictures of the Swallowtail, but maybe I just was lucky this first time.

I also stumbled upon a Green Hairstreak, which was fun, and I saw glimpses of two other butterflies that I could not identify. This island will surely be visited more times during the season as I also would like to get pictures of the Swallowtail eating nectar and maybe try to take flying pictures, will be hard I know.

Please enjoy the photos until next time.