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flowers. So I obtained a 10' bamboo cane which I could attach
to my net and persuaded my father to run me over (metaphorically
speaking) to the purple hairstreak stronghold because it is
impossible to coneal a 10' cane down one's trouser leg and not
only look3 obscence but renders any form of locomotion impossible.
However, I reached the place and caught two beautiful females
with iridescant blue patches on the forewings, and one male.
Brimstones (Gonepteryx rhamni) are locally common as well,
their distribution being dependant on the larval foodplant -
buckthorn.
On many roadside verge's where hedgeparsley grows are found
those harbingers of Spring, the orange tips (Anthocharis
cardamines) so called because the male has conspicuous orange
tips to the wings.
The common and holly blues (Polyommatus icarus and Celastrina
argiolus) are common in the Forest, the former where birds foot
trefoil grows and other small Leguminaceae, and the latter when
its 3-6 yearly cycle allow it to be so. i.e. it was very common
in 1971 when I caught most of my specimens, but since then I
have seen few and this year (1974) I have seen none. It is
interesting to note that I have caught two blue females of the
common blue which are normally brown all over.
The small copper (Lycaena phlaeas) too is found in some
numbers where its foodplant (dock) is found. Last year from
ova obtained from a wild caught female I bred two nice hindwing
varieties.
The most interesting species of butterfly I have found is the
Essex Skipper (Thymelicus lineola) which most authors would
have us believe is mainly coastal in distribution in the south-
east and I can find no records for Epping Forest, not even in the
Queen Elizabeth's Hunting Lodge collection. It differs from the
large and small skipper (Ochlodes venatus and, Thymelicus sylvest-
ris) respectively in that the antennae tip is fully black which
it is not in the small skipper and the large skipper is mottled
in appearance unlike the Essex skipper.
The last family I will deal with are the Nymphalids, The
comma (Polygonia C-album) is fairly common in the Forest and I
often see it feeding on bramble flowers. I have also caught
near the Chingford Gold Course a specimen of P. c-album f.Hutchinsoni
.