Admirable

I spent the day working on the north side of the house to avoid the heat. By late afternoon the sun had crept around to illuminate the  mint patch.  Tortoiseshell butterflies flitted among the flower spikes like little incandescent illuminations - and there was  this single red admirable* that had latched on to an inflorescence and remained there, supping on the nectar  no matter how close I brought my camera. Perhaps it was justifiably confident that the underside of its wings with the complex tapestry of black, white, blue and tangerine would confuse the eye of a predator - or perhaps it was simply drowsy with sweetness and heat,

'Normally' (what is normal now?) these butterflies migrate to warmer lands at summer's end. However (surprise, surprise) the shift to higher temperatures has increasingly allowed them to  overwinter in Britain. A 400% increase in Red Admiral sightings has been reported this summer and many of them will not leave.

Unlike the Asian hornet and others of the human kind, some migrants are quite welcome to remain.

*as it was formerly known