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Half a century ago, Belgian Zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans first codified cryptozoology in his book On the Track of Unknown Animals.

The Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) are still on the track, and have been since 1992. But as if chasing unknown animals wasn't enough, we are involved in education, conservation, and good old-fashioned natural history! We already have three journals, the largest cryptozoological publishing house in the world, CFZtv, and the largest cryptozoological conference in the English-speaking world, but in January 2009 someone suggested that we started a daily online magazine! The CFZ bloggo is a collaborative effort by a coalition of members, friends, and supporters of the CFZ, and covers all the subjects with which we deal, with a smattering of music, high strangeness and surreal humour to make up the mix.

It is edited by CFZ Director Jon Downes, and subbed by the lovely Lizzy Bitakara'mire (formerly Clancy), scourge of improper syntax. The daily newsblog is edited by Corinna Downes, head administratrix of the CFZ, and the indexing is done by Lee Canty and Kathy Imbriani. There is regular news from the CFZ Mystery Cat study group, and regular fortean bird news from 'The Watcher of the Skies'. Regular bloggers include Dr Karl Shuker, Dale Drinnon, Richard Muirhead and Richard Freeman.The CFZ bloggo is updated daily, and there's nothing quite like it anywhere else. Come and join us...

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Thursday, April 28, 2011

THE BIG BUTTERFLY HUNT











Regular readers will remember that the other day Graham and I went in search of orange tips - a butterfly species that I hadn't seen in Woolsery for over thirty years. The only specimens that we found were males, and so yesterday Max and I went to see if we could redress the balance. As you can see by the image above left, we did. By the way, all butterflies were released after we filmed/photographed them.

But there was more excitement in store. There were two other species that I had seen in Woolsery as a child, but that were apparently missing when I returned as an adult. These were the Brimstone (Gonepteryx rhamni) and the Small Copper (Lycaena phlaeas). In one afternoon we saw both species. I had last seen G.rhamni in Woolsery in 1972 and L.phlaeas in 1981.

I am not claiming that any of these three species have not appeared in Woolsery in the interim, but only that I have not seen them, and that they have not been reported to me by any of my Natural History spies, like the Rev. Gerald Smith (Retd) who is a tireless photographer of all things great and small in the village and the surrounding areas.

In all, Max and I saw at least 11 species (there were two others that we were not able to identify) in the village yesterday, which considering there have only been 23 species recorded by us since 1971, is not too bad at all. This year is shaping up to be a very exciting one butterfly-wise.

NB: Richard Muirhead writes: 'The relevant sentence in today`s Guardian Country Diary from St Dominic, Tamar Valley is; “Orange-tip butterflies flit across sweet vernal, the coarser grasses, nettles, flowering plantains and patches of lady`s smock…” This is at Sullens Wood.' It seems a bumper year for orange tips everywhere.

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