 |
| Butterfly, Small Blue, Cupido minimus. Female. Hutchinson's Bank, 14 June 2012. |
The Small Blue is a scarce butterfly, though a long way from being our rarest. But it is our smallest, just over 2cm across. The larvae feed on Kidney Vetch, which itself is not all that common, being found in 87 of the 2175 four-square-kilometer tetrads that Kent is divided into for recording purposes.
It's not blue. But it is related to butterflies that are. This female is completely brown, but the males do have a hint of blue:
 |
| Butterfly, Small Blue, Cupido minimus. Male. Hutchinson's Bank, 14 June 2012. |
(I couldn't get quite as close to this one.) It's always interesting to see that the undersides of butterflies' wings look like. This is the female in the top photo:
 |
| Butterfly, Small Blue, Cupido minimus. Female. Hutchinson's Bank, 14 June 2012. |
As is often the case, I had to throw myself onto the ground to get that shot!
The last Glanville Fritillary sighting was on July 5th after being seen in 4 transect weeks, so you may have missed it. The monitored Small Blue population crashed though in 2012, down from 297 in 2011 to 32 in 2012. There will be a few more guided walks for butterflies this summer, details on my butterfly blog.
ReplyDelete