The local hedgehogs were out and about yesterday evening.

One bonus of the hot weather this week has been the chance to see lots of Purple hairstreak butterflies active around the lower branches of oak trees, seeking cooler conditions and moisture.

More Portland wildlife yesterday - Dingy skippers basking, Bloody-nosed beetle larvae roaming & Common lizards skittering. Also grateful to the local people I met who graciously shared important historic, cultural and landscape contexts to particular sites.

Site visits on the Isle & Royal Manor of Portland today - lots of Small as well as Common blues on the wing, plus Painted lady, Small heath and Wall butterfly. @dorsetbutterflies.bsky.social

Children from primary schools in areas of social and economic disadvantage will be offered a taste of life on a working farm and access to the countryside as part of a new partnership between The Crown Estate and The Country Trust. www.thecrownestate.co.uk/news/new-par...

Face-off with a female Holly blue butterfly. She won. @bcwarwickshire.bsky.social @warwickshirewt.bsky.social

Nice to find a reeling Grasshopper warbler this morning - my second of the week! Also passage Wheatear, and first Whitethroats and Lesser Whitethroat of the year.

Warning: 💩 query! Lots of scat in an old hide in a small wetland, Northumberland. No unpleasant smell, seemed to be mostly feathers. Could it be a stoat’s favourite lunch spot? Advice appreciated. @mammalsociety.bsky.social @vincentwt.bsky.social @northwildlife.bsky.social

For #WildflowerHour I present what I think is White Ramping-fumitory - probably naturalised after being inadvertently introduced with soil/gravel.

Tigers on the rampage! Green alkanet being thoroughly mauled this morning by Scarlet tiger moth caterpillars.

Two singing Blackcaps and my first Speckled wood butterfly of the year on this morning’s dog walk. Even the butterfly looked slightly shocked by the sunshine.