Whilst researching places to visit in East Sussex, I noticed that there was a species of butterfly, the
Silver-spotted Skipper, present on and around the South Downs. As it has a very restricted distribution in the UK, and we'd never seen this one before, Jayne and I decided to have a walk in the area around the Seven Sisters and Beachy Head, to see if we could find it.
Beachy Head
We started our walk at the
National Trust's Birling Gap car park, and walked up onto the Downs for a couple of miles to the
Belle Tout Lighthouse (now a B and B) and Beachy Head.
Seven Sisters and Birling Gap
At the start of our walk, we spotted a couple of
Small Skipper, and the first of dozens, if not hundreds, of
Gatekeepers. As we continued up the cliffs we added
Dark Green Fritillary (1),
Chalkhill Blue and
Meadow Brown to the list of butterflies seen, before finding the first
Silver-spotted Skippers just below the Lighthouse.
Chalkhill Blue
As it was a lovely sunny day they were quite tricky to see, but we eventually managed to get a few photos.
Silver-spotted Skipper
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