BirdForum is the net's largest birding community dedicated to wild birds and birding, and is absolutely FREE!

Register for an account to take part in lively discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="brianfm" data-source="post: 1537902" data-attributes="member: 11997">Now to come to my quiet time of contemplation.  I had one yesterday with my mate in the woods.  The woods seemed devoid of  birds, although I'm sure there were there somewhere, so we took time to study the butterflies.  We found nine species and in the small area we stopped for a while we found five of them.  I took special note of the plants too and there was much Enchanters Nightshade about.  This is a favourite of mine.  A plant easily over looked unless you tale special note.  My friend was impressed whe I showed him it under the eye glass.  These are the sort of things you can miss unless you take time out to really look at a specific area and I think the smaller the area, the more you can often see.  Less can definately be more in nature.I'll add below what is said about Enchanters Nightshade in R Mabey's Flora Britannica.  I have yet to get a decent photo of this plant which can do it justice.1 Small Skipper  2 Green Veined White  3 Comma 4 Speckled Wood  5 Enchanters Nightshade ‘The sixteenth century Flemish Botanist Matthias de L’Obel reported that the botanists of Montpellier identified Bittersweet as the charm that Homer’s witch Circe used to turn Ulysees’s crew into pigs, but the Parisian botanists (‘Lutetiani’) favoured this species (i.e. Enchanters Nightshade), which thus became Circaea lutetiana and in English Enchanters Nightshade.’</blockquote>

Verification