Who knew a Red Admiral could be that hirsute.
The first frosts have happened, the leaves are off the trees, the days are getting damper and drearier and it looks like the pictures I took of a Comma and Red Admiral on a beautifully sunny day in late October will be the last butterfly pics of the year for me.
With its jagged wings this Comma looks like some kind of sinister valkyrie. I like it.
The butterflies were enjoying the blossom on the same bush that attracted the Holly Blues all the way back in early April.
Here is my very last butterfly image of the year. For some reason I like the image blurry (it’s the first time this year I’ve felt that way, and there’ve been quite a few blurry ones). For a last image of the season, it just works for me: Red Admiral, flying off into the sunset.
Learning about Photography, Butterflies and the White Rainbow 
Amazing pictures, the hairy red admiral is extraordinary! Something triste about the blurred departure.
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Thanks, Fliss. Yes, something poignant about Red Admirals in autumn. Apparently some do try surviving the winter here, but most of them attempt the migration to Southern Europe. Difficult enough to understand how swallows and swifts with their strong and fast flight manage it, but fluttering butterflies? So many questions about how they have enough energy in their tiny bodies and how they navigate, especially at night getting across the channel. Some of the time crossing must be at night, for some of them, mustn’t it? Unless the butterflies in the West of England make their way along the coast to Dover and turn right to Calais. And do they somehow know when the winds are favourable or is it just pot luck? Whatever, it seems like an incredible feat of endurance – for those that do endure it. Plucky wee thing, the Red Admiral.
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