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Good insect photography conditions at times today, wind permitting: they were basking, trying to warm up (hot & cloudless is difficult). Here's a Slender-footed Robberfly Leptathrus brevirostris. It used to be numerous on the Cotswold grassland commons...

Trust the weather to change just when Purple Emperor larvae are pupating. It's not just the rain: try doing This in a gale... (photo taken in the wild)

Parhelophilus hoverfly basking by my garden pond this morning. The pond's for dragonflies, damselflies, soldierflies, hoverflies & newts, rather than frogs & toads. I think this is P. frutetorum (= of bushes in bad Latin). Larvae are semi-aquatic.

An emergence of these thugs from my garden pond this week. Then they behave Badly. Love it!

My fifth Small Tortoiseshell of the year, and the first of the summer brood, in the garden today. Some butterfly folk in the South East see more Large Ts than Small Ts these days...

Yay! Downland Beefly dusting itself on the Stroud Commons today. One of my fav flies, and a Good News Species - undergoing a dramatic expansion...

Time was (it was called the C20th) when one didn't expect to see Marbled White before July. Now, I often manage to see it at the end of May in the Cotswolds. Today.

Yay! Privet Hawkmoth in moth trap (opened with 6 year old grandson). Now I feel six years old too...

Purple Emperor larva pupating - a tricky thing at the best of times, even more tricky in windy weather. At this range the 2025 Purple Emperor season will kick off nationally in mid-June, depending on the weather...

OTD 50 years ago, snow stopped play at Derby v Lancs at Buxton. Legend holds that this was Sir Clive Lloyd's first snow (Guyana & W Indies). Snow also fell in London. Then the Long Hot Summer of 1975 was born...

Two nice hoverflies photoed near Stroud today: Chrysotoxum festivum (? breeds on root aphids!) and Volucella inflata (breeds in sap runs).

Big hatch of lovely Marbled Whites on the Stroud Commons, Cotswolds, today.

Heffalumps! Small and Large Elephant Hawkmoths side by side, and I feel 12 years old again...

Yay! New Purple Emperor pupa found at 11pm last night, by UV torchlight (the pupating larvae & pupae flouresce strongly). 7m up in sallow canopy, photoed at 10m. Vaguely near Daneway Banks, Glos.

My first horsefly of the year today, a lovely female Tabanus bromius, but I still haven't seen (or squashed) a Common Cleg this summer - they'll come...

Starting very soon, probably tomorrow afternoon somewhere in E Hants, W Sussex or Surrey, possibly Oxon or Kent, the 2025 Purple Emperor season - and they could be extremely good this year, & the males even more violent than usual. Don't miss out!