A travelling butterfly
Every year, these red admirals (Vanessa atalanta) fly to The Netherlands (and beyond) from the south of Europe. I saw this one the other day, so it seems they have arrived again:
Olympus Stylus 1s, 135mm, ISO125, f5.6, 1/250s
These butterflies have a spectacular pattern when seen from the side:
Olympus Stylus 1s, 300mm, ISO200, f4, 1/250s
Some people think butterflies can't fly all that well and just flap about a bit, but many species of butterflies are very strong flyers that can cover large distances.
These red admirals fly from Spain all the way to Finland, for instance, about 3000km (1850 miles). They are not very fast, though: it takes them about five weeks to cover this distance.
i was fascinated to find out how some butterflies get their color by having small holes in their wings.
the small holes means the wings are almost worn out and the dust on their wings came off
they must have been flying and flapping them a lot that's why
This is a miracle of the nature!
Great, isn't it? Some birds' feathers do the same. All the things you don't want in a camera like interference, refraction, and diffraction, make nice colours on animals.
@ocrdu prachtig ..
you're also posting daft man
Many pretty things flying about, I can't not photograph them 8-).
Quite fascinating yes.
Hard to fathom flying that far, in large, buffeting winds, with such thin wings. Amazing little creatures, that's for sure. As you say, tougher than one might think, though still amazing.
A few years ago there were a lot of such butterflies. The flowering lime trees were fluttered by butterflies / or flutterbies? :)
Or both 8-). We usually don't see great numbers of them where I live, but they are here every year.