Anthocharis cardamines

Advection Frost

Dipladenia flower about to unfurl

From a palm tree that produces small coconut like fruit. The trunk and fronds are covered with these thorns. They are up to six inches long and extremely sharp. The theme "tip" for today's Looking Close on Friday group inspired this photo.

Padiham, Lancashire

Last years leaves can still be seen on these trees

Male Orange Tip butterfly in my garden

Disgusting !!!!! - Fly tipping in Red Beck Valley

A lovely little valley and then some ********* come and dump this over a wall ......

Reported to our Local Council

Another slide restoration from the 1990s, this one showing the waste from slate mining in Wales.

Today of course, such waste is a valuable asset with many uses.

weiblicher Aurorafalter

Orange tip Butterfly seen at RSPB Leighton Moss. (2123)

Lapwing (Vanellus vanellus)

Loch Spelve, Isle of Mull

Snow Bunting - Plectrophenax Nivalis

Snow buntings are large buntings, with striking 'snowy' plumages. Males in summer have all white heads and underparts contrasting with a black mantle and wing tips. Females are a more mottled above. In autumn and winter birds develop a sandy/buff wash to their plumage and males have more mottled upperparts.

Globally, they breed around the arctic from Scandinavia to Alaska, Canada and Greenland and migrate south in winter. They are a scarce breeding species in the UK, in Scotland, making them an Amber List species. They are more widespread in winter in the north and east when residents are joined by continental birds.

They are listed under Schedule 1 of the Wildlife & Countryside Act.

The snow bunting lives in very high latitudes in the Arctic tundra. There is no apparent limit to its northern range, while the southern range is limited by the duration of daylight, which influences their reproductive activity. This species is found in the high Arctic tundra of North America, Ellesmere Island, Iceland, higher mountains of Scotland, Norway, Russia, North Greenland, Siberia, Novaya Zemlya, and Franz Josef Land. During the winter, this bird migrates to the circumglobal northern temperate zone including the south of Canada, north of the United States, north of Germany, Poland, Ukraine, and east to central Asia. During the last ice age, the snow bunting was widespread throughout continental Europe.

During the breeding period the snow bunting looks for rocky habitats in the Arctic Since the vegetation in the tundra is low growing, this bird and its nestlings are exposed to predators, and in order to ensure the survival of its offspring, the snow bunting nests in cavities in order to protect the nestlings from any threat. During this period, buntings also look for a habitat rich in vegetation such as wet sedge meadows and areas rich in dryas and lichens. In the winter, they look for open habitats such as farms and fields where they feed on seeds in the ground.

Population:

UK breeding:

60 pairs

UK wintering:

10,000-15,000 birds

Looking close...on Friday!:-)

The subject is tip . . .

Orange tip (Anthocharis cardamines) butterfly on Lady's smock (Cardamine pratensis).

RSPB Baron's Haugh, Motherwell...have learned its best not to photograph these in bright sunshine!

Just enough snow to give this bison frosted tips 😊

Aurorafalter / Orange tip / mariposa aurora / L’Aurore

Anthocharis cardamines

Explore flic.kr/s/aHsmV72qC4

Carr Mill.

Zingem 28-10-2019

Thanks for visit, comments and awards

TIP: Press L to view in light box or Z to zoom!

No private group or multiple group invites please!

Viceroy butterfly surveying its domain.

Common.

Captured for Looking close on Friday: Tip. HLCoF everyone!

Tune ♥

Credits ♥

Weekly challenge for Looking close on Friday!

Male on Lady's Smock

Anthocharis cardamines

buff-tip

A photograph of a golden tipped fence surrounding a portion of the Windsor Castle.

The Orange Tips have been around in my garden for a while now but this is the only one I've seen land, fortunately I had the camera at the ready, extender and all!!

Anthocharis cardamines (OrangeTip) is a small butterfly belonging to the Pieridae family. They emerge in early April. The males can be easily recognized by the orange tips of their wings which the females don't possess. They can be found throughout Europe and temperate Asia as far as China.

A Female Orange Tip butterfly (Anthocharis cardamines) on the bright pink spring flowers

Martin Down, Hampshire

Green Bees don't care about the petal tips, they don't have pollen or nectar on offer

bushveld purple tip/colotis ion

Sorry, can't show the purple tip, its on the inside, although with butterflies its called the upper side.

Update: iNaturalist's ID seems to be: diverse white/appias epaphia contracta www.inaturalist.org/observations/10243925

Eastern-tailed Blue butterfly taking nectar from a White Clover floret in deep grass.

As I understand things, the eye-spots and tail-like appendages are designed to mimic the insect's head. All in the hope that a predator attack there and saving the life of the butterfly. Seems to work. I've encountered specimens with that part of their wing clipped by what appears to be a bird's beak.

Common though not abundant, this year.