Sleeping Partners

Common blue (Polyommatus icarus) – Blackmoor, Somerset, UK. ID JB4_3763. These butterflies were seen on a walk organised by the Somerset Wildlife Trust to Blackmoor and Ubley Warren that was lead by John Dickson. John is an Adder expert and chaired the South-West Regional Amphibian and Reptile Conference which I attended with my son last year – that was a enjoyable day so this was a walk we did not want to miss. The walk was arranged before the hot weather and as John suspected the Adders had dispersed across the reserve and would be hard to spot – he was right!

Despite seeing no Adders this pair of Common Blue butterflies had settled down for the night and were photographed by several in our group. They were very tame (cold and tired) but I did not have my camera with me. I returned in the morning to look for snakes but I also re-found the pair from the night before. I took a photograph, but could not get enough depth of field to get both in focus. Before repositioning for another picture I decided to remove some grass that was in view. Unfortunately, this caused one of the butterflies to fly away. I resigned myself to photograph the remaining butterfly, but more grass needed to go. This caused the other butterfly to disappear. How could I have been so stupid (over optimistic)? Back at home I cropped out the grass in an attempt to save the picture.