Goldfinches and common blue

Goldfinches pass through our garden every day, but recently a pair of goldfinches have been visiting. I have caught a quick glimpse of them in the bird bath from time to time.

This morning I noticed a pair of goldfinches feeding in the track next to our house.

Not long a go the track was full of dandelions which went to see and blew everywhere. Maybe some of the seeds are still laying on the ground.

Later on in the afternoon a common blue butterfly was feeding just over our garden wall on the same track.

We often get holly blue butterflies in the garden, difficult to distinguish unless they settle. You can see the top and under wing markings in this picture

Egg-laying speckled wood and blue butterflies

As we only have a very small garden we have not been able to create a meadow garden as we would have liked. We do let the clover and other small flowering plants remain in our lawn. We also allow some of the lawn edges, where they are bordered by shrubs, to grow uncut. I was really pleased today to see a speckled wood butterfly laying eggs on the long grass at one corner of the garden.


Egg on grass

The garden was also visited by two of the blue butterflies. A female common blue (below) the females have brown upper wings tinged with blue with a fringe of orange spots.


This Holly Blue (blue) was actually photographed just outside our garden on the track where it settled.