The Red Admiral is a large, powerful, and unmistakable butterfly, with velvety black wings crossed by bold orange-red bands and marked with white spots near the tips. It is a strong, fast flier and a familiar sight in gardens, where it is especially fond of buddleia, ivy blossom, and fallen fruit, though it can turn up almost anywhere from woodland to coastal cliffs. Rather than being a true resident in the traditional sense, much of the British population arrives each year as migrants from continental Europe, though increasingly mild winters mean more individuals now survive here year-round. Its foodplant is common nettle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eggs are laid singly on the tips of nettle leaves, and the solitary caterpillars \u2014 variable in colour from black to greenish, studded with branching spines \u2014 construct a protective tent by folding and silking a leaf around themselves, feeding from within this shelter. There are usually two generations in Britain between spring migrants and the summer brood that follows. The species cannot reliably survive harsh frosts at any stage, so while some adults now attempt to overwinter in sheltered spots in the south, the population is topped up each year by fresh arrivals from further south in Europe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Red Admiral is a large, powerful, and unmistakable butterfly, with velvety black wings crossed by bold orange-red bands and marked with white spots near the tips. It is a strong, fast flier and a familiar sight in gardens, where it is especially fond of buddleia, ivy blossom, and fallen fruit, though it can turn […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":13,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[5,9,4],"class_list":["post-34","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-vanessids","tag-hibernator","tag-migratory","tag-nettle-feeders"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34\/revisions\/35"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/testing20261014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}