“Purple emperor-watching with Matthew and Neil is not your average butterfly entertainment, ethereal and somewhat effete. Theirs is a raucous, adrenaline-fuelled spectator sport. The emperors themselves seem to play to the crowd. Pugnacious males dart around the crowns of oaks, staking out their territory, jetting about with muscular flicks of their wings, twirling on their own axes, elevating a hundred feet into the air. They are the SAS of butterflies, fit, fearless and chemically armed.” ButterflyButterfliesRewildingAnimal WatchingButterfly WatchingPurple Emperor Book:Wilding Source: Wilding
“Think testosterone,’ says Matthew, ‘multiply it by πr2 and double it. Forget boys locked in boarding schools. They’ve spent ten months as a caterpillar waiting for this. They’ve pupated, they’re mature and they’re desperate. They’re squaddies in the disco on a Saturday night. They’re sailors in port after a nine-month voyage.” ButterflyButterfliesRewildingAnimal WatchingButterfly WatchingPurple Emperor Book:Wilding Source: Wilding
“Deep, rich orange and speckled with black, every now and again a flick of their wings flashed an underside of green and mother-of-pearl - the silver wash that gives the fritillaries their name. The female flies straight and level, the slow semaphore of her wing-beats and the scent from the tip of her abdomen exuding allure. The male swoops in tight loops under and up and in front of her, stalling so she can pass beneath him through a shower of intoxicating scent-scales shed from his forewings.” WildlifeButterfliesWildingFritillariesFritillary Book:Wilding: The Return of Nature to a British Farm Source: Wilding: The Return of Nature to a British Farm