As I was away I missed the Mass Lobby of parliament under “The Time is Now” banner to lobby about The Environment Act and The Nature Recovery Network. The turn-out was good and a fair number of MPs did come out to talk with the lobbyists, if they understood the need for action sufficiently that if will to lead to real action, only time will tell.
Meanwhile I got to spend the morning out in the dunes at Braunton Burrows NNR, fewer people but more military training.
One feature that could not be missed was the number of painted lady butterflies, they were everywhere! However it was not one of those that caught my attention nectaring on a stray buddleja bush, but a dark-green fritillary.
dark-green fritillary
The Burrows are an amazing place to visit, huge dunes with wet dunes slacks between, stabilised so that there is a rich and varied vegetation. The outer edges run onto a large sandy beach, with lost of species of more mobile habitats. I came across one plant I did not recognise, which turned out to be hound’s tongue.
hound’s tongue (thanks to Ian Ralphs for the ID)
The dune slacks are very good for orchids, we saw pyramidal orchid, marsh orchid, early marsh orchid and, my favourite, marsh heleborine.
marsh heleborine
My stay in Devon was all too brief though and in the afternoon we headed home, a brief stop in a lay-by did yield a very smart large skipper, only my third this year!
large skipper
Blashford Lakes Nature Reserve 