Butterfly signals a pause, for reflection

Wenlock Edge: Shropshire It's easy to see how the comma butterfly got its English name, but devilishly hard to work out where the French one came from

I crept up on the butterfly as its wings flexed, pumping like delicate bellows, as it took in salts from dried dog urine. For a moment I thought it might be a fritillary - the upper sides of the wings were a rich orangey-brown with complex dark markings, the kind of colour unique to the old slide transparencies of Agfa film.

Then it detected my presence and flew up powerfully, manoeuvred in a seemingly random pattern, and settled on a leaf of yellow flag iris. I could see by the shape of its wings, like holes clipped from the edges of a bus ticket, that it wasn't a fritillary but a comma butterfly.