tortoiseshells

The Big Butterfly Count's discovery of three times as many small tortoiseshells as any other species in Scotland this year is boost for conservationists after a disastrous decline in small tortoiseshell numbers in England over the past decade.

UK butterfly numbers fall following coldest summer in 18 years 2011

She was a kid with Buddy Holly tortoiseshells and a streak in her hair the color of Easter grass.

The Wreck of Me Neil Serven 2011

Some even had grand names such as red admiral and painted lady, while others included the peacock and small tortoiseshells.

Country diary: Achvaneran 2010

This time last year we counted at least 15 mixed aristocrats on just one small buddleia bush, with more peacocks than the small tortoiseshells and red admirals.

Country diary: Achvaneran 2010

Every time Harriet gamboled past the buddleia, a host of tortoiseshells and painted ladies rose into the air, as if the very petals themselves had come to life and taken flight.

Winter Bloom Tara Heavey 2010

The still existing fragments of writing of this period are found almost exclusively on tortoiseshells or on other bony surfaces, and they represent oracles.

A History of China Wolfram Eberhard 1949

Peacock butterflies, "eyed" like Emperors 'robes, open and shut their wings upon the petals; large tortoiseshells are flitting from flower to flower; mouse-coloured humming-bird moths are poising before the red lips of the geraniums; and a stream of common white butterflies is crossing the lawn to the flowers at the rate of twenty a minute.

The Naturalist on the Thames 1882

We used to catch white 'uns, and yaller ones, and sometimes what we used to call tortoiseshells.

The Ocean Cat's Paw The Story of a Strange Cruise George Manville Fenn 1870

A blue butterfly we found in the dust of the road, without the spirit to fly, and lifted him into a field to let him have a chance of life; a few tortoiseshells, and so on -- even the white butterflies are quite uncommon, the whites that used to drift along like snowflakes.

Field and Hedgerow Being the Last Essays of Richard Jefferies Richard Jefferies 1867

The buddleia bush was covered in red admirals, peacocks, tortoiseshells.

Telegraph.co.uk - Telegraph online, Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph 2011