At this time of year it is the insects that take centre stage on the nature reserve and we’re a great place to look for and admire a wide range of butterfly species. Of the 58 species that breed in the UK, you could see 31 of them here – albeit not on the same visit.
In the courtyard garden around the Visitor Centre check out the buddleia, you should see Red Admirals, Peacocks and Small Tortoiseshells.
Red admiral by Terry Hollands
A walk in the woods could reward you with the brown and cream Speckled Wood – watch the males perform a spiralling dance as they compete over the sunny glades.
Speckled wood by Anna Allum
In the meadows, hedgerows and grassland test your identification skills with a host of brown and orange butterflies – Skippers, Gatekeepers, Meadow Browns and Ringlets (the latter might even show themselves in the drizzle). And feisty Small Coppers who, despite their small size, are always ready for a fight.
Small copper by Chris Prince
The range of butterflies you could see this month is at its peak, but there is another reason to go and find butterflies at the moment – it is time for the big butterfly count. The big butterfly count is a nationwide survey aimed at helping us assess the health of our environment. Butterflies react very quickly to change in their environment which makes them excellent biodiversity indicators. Butterfly declines are an early warning for other wildlife losses. That’s why counting butterflies can be described as taking the pulse of nature.
So butterflies are beautiful, and they’re important, but they are really rather fascinating too. Just a glimpse into their private lives reveals there is more to butterflies than meets the eye.
Take the blues, many of them have evolved incredible relationships with ants. The caterpillars secrete sweet sticky juices that the ants find delicious and then when the time comes to pupate, the ants carry the pupae underground and act as security guards until the adult is ready to hatch.
The Painted Lady butterfly is a long distance migrant reaching Britain. They make the 9000 mile round trip from Tropical Africa to the Arctic Circle as a relay race involved 6 successive generations. In 2009 there was a mass migrations where people on the South Downs were reporting their arrival in staggering numbers!
Painted lady by Pete Hughes
The Marbled White takes a scatter-bomb approach to egg-laying - the female simply drops her eggs randomly as she flutters along above the grasses. The adults can often be seen feeding and basking on knapweeds – the bright purple petals contrasting beautifully with the lace-like black and white patterns on the butterfly’s wings.
Marbled white by Frank Prince Iles
The Silver-washed Fritillary – a glorious orange and black butterfly- glides along woodland rides and nectars on bramble flowers and has a much more precise strategy. She seeks out a clump of violets growing at the base of an oak and lays her eggs singly, one or two metres up in a crevice. On hatching, the caterpillar hibernates in the crevice before waking in the spring and descending its tree to feast on the fresh violet leaves. She is better at plant identification than me!
Silver washed fritillary - Terry Hollands
At Pulborough Brooks, our speciality is perhaps the Brown Hairstreak. This rather fussy butterfly demands a combination of large ash trees and well-managed blackthorn hedgerows. The adults congregate around what is known as a ‘master ash’ flitting around and finding themselves a mate but also feeding on the honeydew from aphids high up in the canopy. The female then descends to lay her eggs, selecting a fork in a blackthorn twig between new and old growth. We go searching for these eggs in winter-time – it’s the best way to monitor the population. The eggs hatch and the caterpillar makes its way to the blackthorn bud to eat until ready to pupate and later emerge as a butterfly. It’s one of the latest species to emerge so is not seen until mid July.
Brown hairstreak by Anna Allum
So take some time this month to marvel at these beauties but help contribute to their conservation too. During the national Big Butterfly Count we’ll have a special butterfly themed trail running and have spotting charts ready for you to use – so come along and start counting! You can also download the big butterfly smart phone app from www.bigbutterflycount.org
We’ll be celebrating our brilliant butterflies inside the Visitor Centre too…enjoy a homemade butterfly cake in the café and get your garden set up for butterflies too with our selection of wildlife friendly flower seeds, butterfly nectar feeders and books on wildlife gardening. If you want to improve your butterfly identification skills we also have a range of fantastic books and charts to help you.