January Sightings (Lepidoptera!)

[Neil Hulme]

Happy New Year to you all. My traditional New Year's Day hangover cure consists of searching for Brown Hairstreak eggs, in order to locate new colonies. Following successful hunts on January 1st 2007 and 2008 (both turned out to be large populations ) I had just about given up hope this year, when I found a single egg on a roadside blackthorn at Tortington near Arundel. My new 'other half' Hannah has shown quite an interest in butterflies ( ), so I was keen to let her find some. We moved to the prolific site at Steyning and between us found 27 in an hour. That's more than you've got Susie!
Neil

[Susie]

You think?

Actually, you are right, I don't have more than 27 in the garden now. But ...

add up the few that are left up the road plus I went for a walk up to my local wood on a hill the other day and found brown hairstreak eggs there too so that's another site to add to the map and I reckon I win hands down.

BTW, I have bought six additional blackthorn plants for the garden so my new additions to the family (eggs) will have a spring home.

[Neil Hulme]

Hi Susie,
On a serious note - if we don't get a positive response from the Council I'll arrange an egg-collection posse to come and help re-locate as many as we can to your BH Reserve. Sounds like you've suffered quite high predation levels from tits (I don't mean Mr Hedgechopperman). Draping a bit of chicken-wire type material over the best bits of your blackthorn will reduce the losses, although this level of predation is perfectly normal. They then get hit hard again in the pupal state by shrews and mice
Neil

[Susie]

Thanks Kipper. I have already relocated a few of the eggs into a box in the back garden for safe keeping. Come spring they will be tied onto the new blackthorn whips next to buds and then covered with netting. (many thanks to Pete for advising me what to do). I may get a few funny looks from the neighbours.

I am not surprised so many have been lost to the birds as the hedges are constantly full of birds, having the bird feeders nearby might not help.

Will you be on Sussex BC egg hunt on 17 Jan?

P.S. The site where I found the bhs eggs them other day is the place where I think I will find Purple Emperor next summer. Can't wait!!!

[Neil Hulme]

Hi Susie,
Yes, I'll be on the BH egg hunt - at the front, waving my stick and waxing lyrical alongside our SE Woodlands Officer Steve Wheatley. Your now-experienced eyes would be most welcome, but I'm slightly worried you might find one before me It would be a major coup to find them in this unchartered territory.
Neil

[Padfield]

Thanks for this post: it reminded me I hadn't been out brown hairstreak egg hunting yet this winter. I went out today in glacial temperatures and found half a dozen before my hands froze over so much it seemed a better idea just to go for a walk instead.

So here's my first butterfly picture of the year. I hope we've all had lots of exciting butterfly adventures by the time these fragile little creatures are out of their shells and on the wing in the autumn of 2009.



Guy

[m_galathea]

Nice find with that BH egg Neil. I have looked on the blackthorn there (and by the river) before, but I don't have your eyes! I am convinced that the elm in the same area will have WLH eggs and will continue looking.
Alexander

[Susie]

Lovely shot, Guy.

I hope to come along to the meeting but it depends on what time it starts and whether I can find it! I did try to email the trips address at Sussex BC but it bounced. I shall try again for details.

As if I would be so rude to find an egg before the group leader did.

[Cotswold Cockney]

Good efforts folks.

If you enclose a potted Blackthorn with netting and put a few resulting larvae in it from the ova they will happily feed up and should produce fine healthy examples. When the butterflies emerge, feed them on weak honey solution soaked pads daily ~ rest the pads on the netting at the top ~ the butterflies will feed themselves ~ during hot days of continuous sunshine, use a fine rose watering can to give the enclosure a light soaking occasionally as happens in natural conditions.

First time I did this ~ a long time ago now ~ I enclosed three pairs of bred BHs ( ex ova ) in a metre high potted Blackthorn. After a couple of weeks of activity, I released the insects back in their original habitat. When I removed the netting, I was amazed to find so many dozens of ova on the Blackthorn twigs that it looked like they were frosted white so tightly packed were they!

With good care and attention, these insects will live a month or over in captivity ~ probably that long in the wild too if not predated.

BTW, when searching for both Brown and Black Hairsteak ova on the Blackthorns, I found a White Letter Hairstreak ova on the Blackthorn too!! That larva fed up on the Blackthorn flowers at first ~ leaves later ~ producing a fine female specimen. I have observed wild WLH ova and noticed that they emerge about the first week in March on the Wych Elms ~ immediately moving into the flowers at first as the leaves appear much later. They also feed on the green unripe Elm seeds too again before leaves appear.

The ova of all the British Hairstreaks are relatively easy to find ~ including the Green which in the Cotswolds, lays on Rock Rose and Birds Foot Trefoil ~ but, you wont find their ova during the winter ... .... ~ May and June best for them.
..

[Susie]

Thanks, CC, great advice.

[chanandler04]

Saw my first adult butterfly of the season yesterday a freshly eclosed peacock which must have come in on my christmas tree as it was fluttering around my living room yesterday morning.

[Susie]

Nice sighting, I would love to see a peacock (or any butterfly!) at the moment.

CC: What kind of netting did you use to enclose your brown hairstreaks and blackthorn?

[Dave McCormick]

nice finding a peacock. Wish I could see something, only real thing I saw recent was tadpoles swimming in a large frozen puddle in a hole in a field. Last real lepidoptera I saw was probably a winter moth last month, oh well, its warmer here (around 2c today) than England, so might have a little more chance of finding something soon. Saw buds coming on trees yesterday. Is it a bit early for tadpoles and buds on trees?

[Susie]

I would imagine that the tadpole was left over from last year and was either a late developer or one of those which never does develop because of some fault with it. I've had buds on my sallow since last autumn as soon as the leaves dropped off but they haven't got any bigger during this cold snap. Come the warm weather I am sure they will start bursting and then it will be covered with all manner of flying things feeding on the catkins.

[Piers]

Down here in the South frogs have been breeding in the Autumn rather than the Spring for the last few years. In the New Forest frog spawn in October and November is not uncommon. The recent cold snap has frozen the tadpoles in solid ice! They are unlikely to survive this so a number of ponds in the South and South West (in particular) shall be tadpole free this year.

Felix.

[Susie]

Well I collected 20 brown hairstreak eggs in 20 minutes this afternoon from the site which is due to be trimmed next (I still haven't had a response from the person due to do the cutting ), added them to the other ones I have and I potted up six blackthorn in two large pots. Then I made nets and supports and voila! Two butterfly cages.

[Dave McCormick]

I would imagine that the tadpole was left over from last year and was either a late developer or one of those which never does develop because of some fault with it. I've had buds on my sallow since last autumn as soon as the leaves dropped off but they haven't got any bigger during this cold snap. Come the warm weather I am sure they will start bursting and then it will be covered with all manner of flying things feeding on the catkins.

Maybe, that would have been a possibility if this frozen puddle was not in a field that did not have this hole in the ground about a couple a months ago, but I could have just overlooked it. I did see tadpoles in a pond last autumn, but they were nearly full grown, starting to grow legs.

Suzie, Glad you saved the BH eggs, always not so good when someone does something like trim bushes that have eggs on them and you can't get a response from the person that does it. I have a few Orange-Tip pupae that I reared from caterpillars that were in an area that was about to be dug out. I went back recent and the area is now a flooded pond like place, all cuckoo flowers gone but at least I saved a few of the caterpillars. BTW, when should the adults hatch out of the pupae? There is another area I can release the adults in and they should survive fine as there is a small colony of Orange-Tip there

[Susie]

I have a few Orange-Tip pupae that I reared from caterpillars that were in an area that was about to be dug out. I went back recent and the area is now a flooded pond like place, all cuckoo flowers gone but at least I saved a few of the caterpillars. BTW, when should the adults hatch out of the pupae? There is another area I can release the adults in and they should survive fine as there is a small colony of Orange-Tip there

Well done. The adults should emerge in April (I saw one in March last year though so keep checking them). This should tell you all you need to know. http://www.ukbutterflies.co.uk/species. ... Orange-tip


BTW I managed to get in touch with the person due to do the trimming work here and he was very pleasant and helpful. We are meeting next week so fingers crossed for a good outcome for the BHS.

[Dave McCormick]

Thats good to know Susie about the bushes. It made me think of rather a not so good thing that happened around late August last year. I was out with my camera and saw a female Holly Blue laying eggs on ivy on a wall near my house. I managed to get an ok pic before it flew off. Knowing where this happened, I wanted to check peroiodically (sp?) to see if I could find a caterpillar there. I came back a few days later and the ivy was all cut back! I did find a caterpillar there though, brought it back to rear, but its of a moth, its now a pupae.

I got in touch with someone from BCNI about the ivy being cut back and he said not to worry as there was so many Holly Blues around where I live anyway. It was still not a good thing to see happen, and I am carefully watching all the other known sights of Holly blue in my area now, so noting bad will happen to them.

Thanks about Orange-Tip. I wondered this because the pupae have been sitting in my living room and its been rather warm in there in many occations and it has not tempted them to hatch out sooner or develop faster, like a few other caterpillars I reared.

[Susie]

Probably a good idea to pop them into a cooler place, like a shed or garage, because we wouldn't want them to appear before the time was right for them.