1017 No-less-a-Woody & Large Tortoiseshell Butterfly

Artist Code: 1017. Completed June 2010. Original DONATED. Water colour on Aquarelle Arches 100% hot pressed cotton rag. Unframed size 9″ x 12″ Framed size 16″ x 21″.

This painting was selected for the National Exhibition of Wildlife Art 2010.

Lesser spotted woodpecker, Dendrocopus minor; Large Tortoiseshell butterfly,  Nymphalis polychloros; Sycamore, Acer pseudoplatanus; Ivy, Hedera helix.

I never realized how small Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers are! What a beautiful little bird. I painted this one life-size and many thanks to Ian Dickerson for resource material gathered from Paxton Pits Nature Reserve. This painting was donated to: “A Robins Song” fundraiser of exhibitions and auction by Ian Griffiths with monies raised going to the Childrens Hospice, South West, Cornwall (20th February, 2013).

The sycamore is one of three which are growing in our local churchyard (St Mary’s Church, Comberton, Cambs) colloquially named “The Holy Trinity”. I thought I saw a lesser spotted woody there, but it turned out to be a young great spotted coming out of a nest hole. Great spotted woodpeckers do nest every year in the middle tree. This event was the inspiration behind this painting. The Large Tortoiseshell butterfly (now extinct in Cambridgeshire) was added to show just how small the lesser spotted woodpecker is—slightly larger than house sparrow size.

Maturing soon, the Sycamore,
At sixty years will make a door.
But first provides a hamm’ring ground,
to distance Lesser Woody’s sound.
And also gives a resting place
For ‘rarities’ a sunning space.