Stratford-Upon-Avon Butterfly Farm

I'm not sure if I've been to a butterfly farm before or not. I have a sense that somewhere in my travels I have, but for the life of me I can't remember where or when. This was a fabulous experience. M&K waited outside for me, they didn't want to go in.

Of course, Madeleine started going mad with the camera and much to my disappointment, they were all fuzzy. I turned the camera off and on again; tried different settings, and generally fiddled with my camera. All the photos were fuzzy. Damn!! I sat down on a bench and looked at my camera in frustration and realised that coming from the cold outside into the warm, muggy butterfly atmosphere the lens was fogged up!! Once I sorted that out and my lens became the same temperature as the enclosure, all was well.

Here's one of the photos with the foggy lens. I had just wiped the lens down and by the time I took the photo, it had partially fogged up again.

Blue Morpho butterfly with wings open

Blue Morpho butterfly with wings closed

When they sleep at night, they fold their wings so that only the underside is seen. The underside of their wings is a dull brown color. This makes them invisible to other creatures who may want to eat them. When a bird comes too close to a blue morpho butterfly, they flash the blue on their wings to startle the bird and make it fly away.

http://mle.matsuk12.us/rainforest/emergent_layer_animals.html

In various spots they had little tables with obviously butterfly treats as the little critters kept landing on them. This was one of the yellow ones enjoying it's treat.

I have no idea what this butterfly is, but she/he is rather beautiful.

There were heaps of these guys. Very slow moving and seemed to hang off the leaves.

Now what a stunning fellow!!

This is a very poor photo of the “Emerging Cage” where the butterflies “emerge” !! I didn't see any butterflies emerge.

And here's a bit of information about the “Emerging Cage”

This guy was on the ground near the Emerging Cage and I almost stepped on him/her.

If anyone knows the names of these butterflies, please let me know because I have absolutely no idea. I don't even know if they are British or not. I just know that they are gorgeous.

There were a few birds in the Farm as well. I noticed this little guy when I first came in and when I got near the end, he was still sitting there watching the world go by. I think he needs a name. Any ideas??

There was a spider enclosure (which I stayed well away from) and a caterpillar enclosure that I figured I would go back to if I had time. I knew my time in there was limited.

A pond with fish.

This butterfly was just sort of sitting on the mesh around the enclosure. Not a great photo, but I felt it was an interesting shape.

My camera had a bit of problem deciding what to focus on. He moved before I got a chance to try again. Problem with butterflies is that they won't just sit still while I take their pictures. A bit like the Ally dawg. As soon as she sees the camera, she has to move towards me to check out what I'm doing.

One more bird

Now it was time to leave. I spotted an M coming inside and figured he had snuck in to let me know it was time to move on. Problem was, we had a limit on our parking and didn't want a parking ticket. As it turned out, we were 1 minute late and the parking guy was wandering around checking tickets, so we were lucky.

I will be offline for the next little while. Tomorrow is Christmas. Boxing Day we are off to Southampton to visit the family that has adopted me and M (K's extended family). On Saturday the 27^th I'm off to Wales again to visit Kahless and Mrs. K. I'm not sure when I will come back from there. The following Thursday, the 1^st January, K and I are off to Norwich for a few days. M will join us on the night of the 2^nd and then we all come back on the Sunday.

So a pretty busy next couple of weeks. I will be writing as I go, but not sure when I will be posting. So, until the next time.

Cheers you lot

Madeleine

Wednesday, 24 December 2008