Bee And Brocade

This is a very quick, busy and tiny solitary bee in a convolvulus bloom. I usually try to focus on insects' eyes but when I saw this image on screen I was struck by the pollen grains on the body of the bee. An excellent pollinator. :)

I used to grow Linaria purpurea 'Canon J Went' from seed to sell to my plant centre customers. A couple of plants have seeded by our back door. Amazing how the toadflax brocade moth has found them and laid her eggs. These moths arrived here in 1950 and are now in decline. The caterpillar in my image was joined by a spider which suddenly ballooned high into the sky on a silken line.

I saw my first gatekeeper butterfly of 2023 this morning. It's now officially high summer. Nice to see a footman moth too. Plenty of butterflies about including lots of accommodating female brimstones.