Bob's Butterfly and Bird Blog: Return to Transylvania.

I have recently returned from the fabulous countryside in Transylvania. My eldest son had his 2nd wedding of the year there, as Anna, his lovely wife comes from Transylvania, so following their British wedding in May, we were treated to a proper traditional wedding in Transylvania.

This actually made it the 3rd wedding of the year, as Matt, my younger son and his wife Emily also got married this year. They too joined Lisa and I, as well as Jean, my Mother-in-law. The biggest problem is getting to the country, with having to fly from Luton on a very early flight.

Weddings in Transylvania are very different to a British wedding, and are a lot of fun and partying over a couple of days. Having been to Transylvania back in 2022 to meet Anna's parents and having one of the best trips I've ever had, I was hoping that Lisa and I would have time to head out into the fantastic countryside which is teeming with nature. I didn't need to worry as we were able to head out onto the hills several times. Although there wasn't anything like as much to see in September as there had been in June, it was still very impressive. Our first walk was after most of the butterflies had gone to roost, but Lisa was really pleased to have seen around 7 new species in a really short time.

As in Britain, there are currently a lot of Clouded Yellows on the wing. However, in Transylvania nearly all of them are Pale Clouded Yellow (Colias hyale), a species that is a mega rarity over here. My best photo from the whole trip was of one of these beauties as it nectared on Alfafa.

Pale Clouded Yellow on Alfafa.

Pale Clouded Yellow on Clover.

The meadows just above the village where we were staying are full of flowers and the insect life thrives in the area where there are no insecticides used, if only we could say the same here in Britain!!

Short-tailed Blues were also very numerous, although it wasn't easy getting decent photos of these very small butterflies.

Female Short-tailed Blue.

On two occasions we saw Swallowtails. One vanished very quickly, but the 2nd one was busy egg laying. I saw the butterfly lay one egg, so with Lisa following the butterfly to try and photograph her, I searched for the ova. Having found it I marked it and joined Lisa to photograph the butterfly after it had stopped to nectar.

Female Swallowtail.

Swallowtail ova.

There were also reasonable numbers of Oberthur's Grizzled Skippers and Weaver's Fritillary in all 3 sites that we managed to get to. The day before the wedding we looked around the graveyard of the church, and saw several Weaver's Fritillaries egg laying.

Oberthur's Grizzled Skipper.

Weaver's Fritillary.

Weaver's Fritillary ova.

Another Fritillary that we saw a few of was the Nickerl's Fritillary. A species that I saw here in 2022. These were all very fresh specimens, so I guess the latest brood had just started to appear. It was a shame our time was short as I would have loved spending more time trying to get some good images of this species.

Nickerl's Fritillary.

I was really hoping that we would see a Large Copper, an absolutely gorgeous species that I knew would really impress Lisa. Strangely, the first one that we saw was in the garden of the cottage we were all staying in. Matt was relaxing in a hammock when he spotted it fly over the garden. I saw a quick glimpse of it but Lisa didn't get a good look at all. A bit later I spotted another one. This time Lisa did see it, but once again the butterfly kept on flying through. On our last day of walking up the meadow above the cottage, we walked in a different direction and chanced upon a female Large Copper. Not quite as impressive as the male, but still lovely, and this one did stay for a few shots before it vanished flying high over the trees.

Female Large Copper.

Later that same day, after having lunch with all the wedding guests, we had one final chance of a walk in the meadow, so we headed off to the same area hoping to see the butterfly again. We didn't see her, but instead saw a gorgeous male in the same spot. Here we both got a few photos including open wing shots.

Male Large Copper.

A little later I managed to photograph a male Reverdin's Blue, a butterfly that was new to me. We had seen a female on our first stroll, but I hadn't realised at that time that it was a Reverdin's and not a Silver-studded Blue that I had thought it was, so I hadn't photographed it. Fortunately Lisa had got a shot so we could get a identify it.

My shots of the male are not going to win any prizes, but it was pleasing to get one new species.

Male Reverdin's Blue.

I had decided to only travel with the macro lens as I wanted to travel light. Lisa however, did take her longer zoom that paid off with some of the birds we saw and got quite close to. These included a young Cuckoo and several Red-backed Shrikes as well as a Little Owl that spent all day on the roof of the next door property.

We did however, also find other insects that were a little bit special On one walk we were joined by Emily, and she spotted a Field Cricket, a species that was totally new to me.