Moth meets butterfly on the one of the crowning glories in the chalk grasslands of the South Downs
#ButterflyWeek

#6-spotBurnetMoth
#CommonBlueButterfly
#GreaterKnapweed
#chalkgrassland

Late afternoon walk up 2 #DevilsDyke along #DykeApproach path where the magnificent magenta crowns & their cousins where still providing food, their silver seed-heads shelter & perches to a host of insects, among them Grey-backed Snout Hoverfly (Rhingia rostrata).
#GreaterKnapweed
#Blackknapweed

Stars of burnished gold feeding other stars:

⭐ One still feeding gems of Chalk Hill Blue
⭐ The other, now mostly spent but still a frequent roosting place for Common Blue
#CarlineThistle
#GreaterKnapweed seed-head
#butterflies #chalkgrassland in #Sussex
#wildflowerhour

Breezy day on #SouthDowns today & most of the seed stars have turned to burnished gold.
Yet a few buds revived by days & nights of rain were glowing magenta & all the #bumblebees & many #flies, it seemed, had found their way to feast on #GreaterKnapweed crowns in the sun-bleached #chalkgrasslands.

Blue ribbon on golden stars.
#CommonBlue #butterflies
#Greaterknapweed #seedheads #botany
in the #chalkgrasslands
Nature needs more of her chalk lands returned to her!

Just this for #wildflowerhour this week as it is so stunning!

The shining seed head of that July stalwart of our #chalkgrasslands, the #GreaterKnapweed, still in flower here and there and still feeding the #insects.

Along #DykeAppoach path in Sussex.

Among the shining stars of #GreaterKnapweed seed heads, the standouts of the many stalwart plants still feeding trillions in drought conditions, are still the #Ragwort and the #Blackknapweed.

#DykeApproach path along #chalkgrassland
Nature needs more of her chalk land returned to her!
📷🧵

A tattered female #MarbledWhite on #Lady'sBedstraw & #GreaterKnapweed in turn along the Dyke Approach path yesterday.
I'm always drawn to those butterflies who are showing the marks of the many injurious encounters of their short lives.
Yet they fly on!
Amazing creatures!
#DevilsDyke

#commonknapweed, #greaterknapweed, #purpleloosestrife, #wildmarjoram, #meadowcranesbill, #muskmallow, #commonpoppy, #raggedrobin, #sainfoin, #fieldscabious, #smallscabious, #teasel,