Butterflies

There were lots of butterflies on the buddleia this afternoon, despite it being quite windy. I'm really pleased as I drastically pruned it in Spring down to 3 main stems quite short and didn't know if it would grow back enough to flower this year. I saw peacock butterflies, gatekeepers, a painted lady, a comma and amazingly a silver-washed fritillary. A shame I didn't do the Big Butterfly Count. Annoyingly due to the wind the butterflies were mostly keeping their wings closed. Another hot day today reaching 28.3C, but more bearable than yesterday despite it only being 3C less indoors. I was up at 5:30 this morning as way too hot to sleep anymore - nice to get the doors and windows open and let the cooler air in. How awful about all the fires and loss of homes, astonishingly the London Fire Brigade saw their busiest day since WWII.