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 during late spring and summer was fantastic, very sunny and dry with lots of flowers and butterflies. However from mid August onwards the weather became very much more unsettled with lots of rain to make up for the late spring and the first half of summer. This was much appreciated by the plants who were starting to suffer in the drought conditions..
BUTTERFLIES
A very good year for butterflies. Due to my house building project I hardly got out to look at butterflies, but I did not need to - they came to me. A Lesser Purple Emperor sat on the rim of the cement mixer as it was going round. On the ground, where we had been mixing cement, were all sorts. The skippers included a Marbled Skipper, my first record in this part of the Département, and my girls found a freshly hatched Silver Spotted Skipper in the garden drying its wings. Swallowtails and Scarce Swallowtails were very regular visitors, as were Purple Emperor, White Admiral and Southern White Admiral, Map both first and second generations. There were lots of blues; Short Tailed, Province Short Tailed, Long Tailed, Common, Adonis, Chalkhill, Silver Studded/Idas (I didn’t try to identify which one as this would have needed careful study of the front pair of legs for the presence (silver studded) or absence (idas) of a small “hair pencil” on the anterior aspect of the tibia of the leg and building work interfered), Holly, Small and Brown Argus. Also in late summer we had a visit from a Geranium Bronze which is firmly established in the whole region. Of the fritillaries, I had a good mix in the garden with Silver Washed being seen into late September.
Even last Sunday (9th October) there was quite a lot flying; Small and Sooty Coppers, Long Tailed and Common Blues, Small, Southern Small and Large Whites, Clouded Yellow, Speckled Wood and a Large Tortoiseshell.
For the migrant species such as Long Tailed Blue it has not been a prolific year. I have no reports of Lang’s Short Tailed Blue and very few for Bath White.
On the moth front: I had the distinct impression that although quite abundant there were not so many Humming Bird Hawk moths about this year.
There was an abundance of Jersey Tigers in late August with several people proudly bringing me individuals that they had trapped for me in jam jars. This really is a very striking moth. I was lucky enough to be able to observe one nectaring one day. Its zebra striping was impressive enough. Then, when it flew from flower to flower (Hemp Agrimony), there was the dazzling scarlet flash of its hind wings. Probably the most memorable insect related event of the year for me.
FLOWERS
The flowers are still putting on a great show, lots of autumn flowering Crocuses and the true Autumn Crocus as well. There are a lot of yellow flowers about at the moment by the road side, I am not sure what they all are but the dominant colour at the moment is definitely yellow.
BIRDS
The big bird news is that the Lammergeier chick near me has successfully fledged and can, at the moment, be spotted flying around with its parents. It seems to have been a good breeding year for the species throughout the mountains here.
I had an injured bird of prey brought in to me a while back. The warden, who brought it in, thought it was a Buzzard but to me there seemed to be something not quite right. Anyway I kept it and treated it. Then when Lydia (another vet with whom I work) saw it, we put our heads together and got out some books to find it was in fact a Goshawk!
My most recent bird story is about a Tawny owl that was brought in with a broken wing. Usually this means euthanasia, so I examined it carefully, there was a reasonably clean break of the humerus (forearm) so I did an operation then strapped the wing up for three weeks. I am delighted to be able to say that he has healed up very well and was released back into the wild a week ago.