Today has been another busy day and just shows how varied and interesting our work here is. In the morning we welcomed a coach load of children from Kirkbride primary school onto the Reserve. Dave was on pond dipping and bug hunting duty with half the class while I took the rest out for a scavenger hunt around the paths. Whilst we didn't quite make it to the den building area on our hunt we did manage to find animal prints, feathers and homes for fairies! A quick drink of milk and we swapped groups for the next 45 minutes. Dave's group had caddisfly larva and wolf spiders amongst lots of other creepy crawlies to keep the kids interested.
We had just survived the heat of the day and waved the kids off on the coach when it was time to go look for marsh fritillary . Only recorded for the first time last year during a snipe count by some of the volunteers we were hoping to get a good show this year. With news from Finglandrigg NNR that their Fritillaries were out and showing we headed out to see what could be found. There were several of the butterflies on the wing and Dave even managed a photograph with some patience! I had never seen them before and I have to say they are beautiful. If you want to see them yourselves you are more likely to get better views at near by Finglandrigg as ours aren't accessible to the public.
Marsh Fritillary Pic: Dave Blackledge