Butterflies — eye-candy on the wing

AS I left to go looking for parasol mushrooms, I noticed the sedum and the valerian in the garden were teeming with butterflies and I couldn’t resist, as usual, stopping to take some photographs, such glorious creatures they were.

The array included peacocks, small tortoiseshells, red admirals and speckled woods. Their splendour, three or four together on the purple tops of the tall verbena or on the pink cushions of low-growing sedum, was eye-candy on the wing. It was heart-warming to see them. Butterflies were scarce all summer. Now, in autumn, they were here again, and in small clouds.

I found no mushrooms in the woods but it seems that one has only to spend half an hour wandering out of doors to be educated in some new aspect — or mystery — of natural history.