A glance up from my paper and I was dropping my sandwich and rushing carefully across the garden. 2 or 3 Gatekeepers were drifting around, a Painted Lady was nectaring on buddleia and last night's roosting male Common Blue was sunning itself on a grass stalk. But this butterfly had appeared from around from our green-leaved plum cherry and looked darker at rest with its wings open. There, 21 days earlier than previous years, was our first definite Brown Hairstreak, in butterfly form, of 2026. It flew and crawled into the depths of the plum cherry to do some egg laying. I went to get Val and it had emerged for a little rest. It disappeared back to do a bit more egg laying, came out, rested briefly, flew around a bit and then was off and away. Very similar behaviour to the one I saw last year, which also did 2 egg laying forays. That was the 17th butterfly species of 2026 in our garden. Not very likely we'll have any more.