MEADOW BROWN

The Meadow Brown is one of our commonest butterflies and obligingly can be seen on the wing even on dull days.

Photo: Alan Watts

The males, who are darker, flit around visiting flowers and searching for females, while the females sit around waiting to be found.  

As you can see from Alan's photo, when they perch the underside of the wings is greyish brown with a bit of orange and a black spot with a single white dot in the centre (Gatekeeper butterflies have two white dots and have more orange on the wings).  

And if you look exceedingly carefully you may be able to see a few tiny BLACK dots like full stops on the underside of the hindwing (Gatekeepers have irregular white dots). 

The eggs are laid about now and the caterpillars feed on grasses before hibernating through the winter till the following May.  So we need to leave some long grass for them.