Graham Hart has lived in Ariege since May 1998 and has known the area since 1991. He has a life-long interest in natural history, which started with butterflies and birds and now includes other insects (especially moths) and flowers. He leads butterfly watching holidays in the region and is writing a book on the butterflies of Ariège. When not out chasing butterflies Graham works as a vet in Ax-les-Thermes.
The weather has continued to be mixed, with some frosts followed by very sunny warm days of up to about 20 °C and mild, cloudy wet weather. As soon as it is sunny butterflies were to be seen, right up to practically the end of the month. The first heavy snow came in the last week of the month, settling down to an altitude of about 1000m. It was followed by three days of sunny then very mild wet weather during which time the snow almost completely disappeared under about 2000m.
BUTTERFLIES
Fourteen species were seen during November, the highest numbers being seen in the first half of the month but even as late as the 20th Tim Nash saw 20 Clouded Yellows, the most common species during November. The others, with the date of the last sighting are as follows; Comma 02.11.03, Painted Lady 18.11.03, Bergers Clouded Yellow and Long Tailed Blue 20.11.03, Small Heath 21.11.03, Small White and Small Copper 22.11.03, Peacock, Red Admiral, Speckled Wood and Wall Brown 23.11.03, Large White and Clouded Yellow 24.11.03. Also Humming Bird Hawk Moths were occasionally seen during the month. Of particular interest is again the Painted Lady, which was seen after several quite hard frosts--it is a species which is supposed to die when the temperature goes under 5°C. Either it found somewhere well sheltered from the frost, perhaps such as in a hole in a stone wall, or it was a fresh migrant from Spain. This latter possibility seems unlikely as the tops of the mountains are all covered in snow and very cold, however sometimes there is a warm wind coming from the south which is even warm at high altitudes causing the snow to melt rapidly.
FLOWERS
There are quite a few flowers to be found still, but rather localised. There is the occasional field full of Knapweeds in flower and others with Hawksbits and members of the Ragwort family. Also some Speedwells, notably Germander Speedwell, Wild Carrot, Mallow and Common Storks Bill were spotted. The seedpods of Spindle were spectacular with their fantastic deep pink colour. On my bit of land there are loads of Spindles and it was a very pretty sight. The Mistletoe this year is absolutely bursting with berrys, I have never seen so many. The Hazel trees are also absolutely covered in young catkins that will flower in February next year. It was a very good autumn for nuts and fruit from trees also, so either this is all following the drought of the summer or as the old folks round here would have you believe, it means we will have a very hard winter, I’ll keep you all posted!
BIRDS
The Lammergeiers have been spotted in their usual haunts preparing for nest building or refurbishement, ready for egg laying in February. There are plenty of Robins about, singing their songs and defending their territories, ready for winter.
We are putting out nuts and fat balls for the Tits; we have Marsh Tit, Blue Tit, Great Tit, the occasional Coal Tit and Nuthatch coming to this food. The Sparrows and a Robin are hopping around below, picking up the crumbs dropped from the feeders. Also I have seen a male House Sparrow on one of the fat balls and making a pretty good job of feeding off of it.