Flutter By, Butterfly

Butterfly, originally uploaded by andyskelton.

..and indeed that’s just what the butterlflies were doing on a trip down to the New Forest Wildlife Park. The temperature in the hot house was 30 degrees; coupled with the humidity this ensured that the butterflies were highly active, unlike myself where I had to wait 5 to 10 minutes for my camera gear to acclimatise to the change in temperature.

There were a wide variety of butterflies on display, and new ones hatching whilst we were there from pupae attached to  lengths of dowel. One pupae was an iridescent gold/bronze which would have been fantastic to see emerge.

I did watch a Monarch butterfly laying eggs on the foliage of the green house, and there were plenty of “wild” caterpillars which the keeper told us were down to butterflies reproducing as opposed to being released.

For those interested in setting up their own facility, London Pupae Supplies are specialist breeders of tropical butterfly and moth pupae and if you hunt through their site you might even be able to find an image of mine there.

And now for the science bit… Canon 1D4, Sigma 150mm lens, at f7.1, 1/400s, ISO 1250.

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