This is Ashes quarry, a former limestone quarry near Stanhope in Weardale that is now a wonderful nature reserve. The quarry floor is partially flooded and is a breeding place for dragonflies and damselflies, but this sheltered western end, which is mostly rough grassland and quarry spoil heaps, is always a good spot to look for butterflies.
It was good to see a small colony of wall browns has become established here. This is a butterfly that needs warmth and shelter, so this sun-trap, with its sun-warmed rock, clearly suits it very well.
Wall browns are very skittish insects, never settling for long in one place. This individual alternated between basking on its pile of rocks and feeding on herb robert flowers blooming amongst the stones.
The convenient supply of floral nectar meant that this one was constantly disturbed by rival males that tried to take over its domain. Wall browns are ferociously territorial, so each one of these incursions resulted in an aerial dogfight, as the butterflies spiralled upwards, so close to me that I could hear their wings clashing, before they separated and fluttered back to their respective territories.
Eventually a female arrived and courtsship began, with the pair walking through the grass and the male tapping the female with his antennae. I think the male is the closer of the two in this picture, with some wing edge damage that might have occurred during one of those bruising dogfights with a rival.
Wall brown colonies tend to be small and don't often persist in the same place for long, but this quarry site is sheltered and warm, with plenty of the caterpillar food plants (grasses), so it might last for a few years.
The warm piles of stones in the quarry are also excellent habitat for sun-basking common darter dragonflies ....
..... chirruping field grasshoppers Chorthippus brunneus
..... and this devil's coach-horse Ocypus olens. This beetle (more pics here) isn't often seen out and about in bright sunlight - it's more often seen in twilight.
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