Butterflies on Corstorphine Hill

 We had a lovely walk around Corstorphine Hill today. It's always a wonderful place for a walk and a particularly nice place on a hot day as there is so much woodland cover to offer shade when it gets too hot (which it is regularly doing these days). 

 We started our walk in the Walled Garden, where the flower border was literally buzzing with a variety of bees and hoverflies, including this Dasysyrphus tricinctus (not the best photo in the world, but a rarely seen hoverfly for us, so worth sharing) 

We were also pleased to see several butterflies in the garden, including this Red Admiral  

and this Peacock

 Beyond the Walled Garden, we were delighted to see Small Copper Butterflies in two different parts of the hill, the first time I've seen this lovely little butterfly this year

It's lovely to see butterflies having a good year after several very poor years. We really do need some rain here though, it's been an incredibly dry year so far and wildfire warnings have been issued across Scotland. (In fact, last weekend there was a fire on Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh).