Where Have All the Butterflies Gone?

We are on our way down to Bournemouth for 5 days at the Bournemouth Airshow and stopped en route for the night at Fordingbridge so we could visit the nearby National Nature Reserve at Martin Down, renowned for its butterfly population. The weather was not ideal with light cloud and a bit of a breeze early on. All the butterflies that we found were low down in the vegetation and very few in number. We did find Dark-freen Fritillary adn Chalkhill Blue but no sign of the Adonis Blue or Grizzled and Dingy skippers. A large number of the butterflies had mite infestations as with the Common Blue and Meadow Brown shown below. Great to see a few Clouded Yellows even if deep in the vegetation. Even when the sun appeared there were very few butterflies in the air - strange when the flowers were so inviting

Fordingbridge in the evening sunshine.