11th August - Grafton Wood

Apologies for the lateness of this!

Had a successful day at Grafton Wood on 11th with Simon Primrose and Richard Smyth. 4 different Brown Hairstreak (3 male, 1 female), all in different areas of the wood (one of these seen by John Tilt). 3 Small Copper, Purple Hairstreak, Brimstone, Painted Lady, multiple Silver-washed Fritillary, Common Blue and the usual suspects - Peacock, Meadow Brown, Gatekeeper, Ringlet, Small White, Large White, Green-veined White. Also found a poor White-letter Hairstreak that was in the process of being chomped by a crab spider.

A quick reminder to everyone visiting over the next few weeks - the orchard hedgerow is still out of bounds and should be avoided. It is NOT on a public footpath and is private land. The Brown Hairstreak is very widespread within the wood and can literally be seen anywhere! To aid new visitors, there are now signposts and maps up showing the best areas to find the Brown Hairstreak.

The Grafton Wood Open Day is on 30th August this year and is bound to be a great social occasion, combined with some good sightings of Brownies. Hope to see some of you there :)

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Sussex Off, But Slow Start

The Brown Hairstreak season in Sussex is now fully underway, but we are still in the very early stages, as the butterfly calendar continues to run late.

The best Sussex sites have always been very poor at providing low-level males, although they make amends by producing such high numbers of obliging females. After getting a nice male at Cissbury Ring (8 August) I was even more pleased to get my best ever shot of a male at Steyning on Wednesday afternoon (12 August, top left), when the clouds suddenly cleared and the temperature increased rapidly. 'Pleased' turned to 'delighted' when I subsequently flushed a female from low in a bramble patch - but she didn't go far. 'Delighted' then gave way to excitement, as I noticed the irregular patterning on her hind wing (bottom left). This ab. uncilinea is apparently a first for Sussex!

Today (15 August) started well, as I returned to the same site at Steyning, which is about 1 Km from the famous Rifle Range. I found two females, one of which remained stationary for 45 minutes, despite the warm, sunny weather (top right).

I later moved on to the Range, where quite a few hopefuls were staring up at the Ash trees. Unfortunately, that's where the hairstreaks stayed. I saw ones and twos scattered around the site, including females, but the big descent to start egg laying is still (eagerly) awaited. None of the females I have found to date has shown any interest in ovipositing.

We are still in that period when the Brown Hairstreak is hard to locate, but they are all in mint condition and fairly inactive. A week from now they will be down in numbers, but fidgeting in and out of the thorn and rapidly collecting nicks and scratches.

The main course is yet to come.

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Brother Betulae Erupts!

This morning I counted 76, repeat 76, Brown Hairstreaks in 2 hrs 15 mins, of which about 30 mins were too cloudy for flight, at Shipton Bellinger on the Hants - Wilts border.  I kicked off with 34 in 37 mins, but would have done better had I arrived 30 mins earlier (I got there at 8.50).  Nearly all were males, in varying condition but including a number that seemed freshly emerged.  I hit the last ball of my innings for 7 - the most I've ever seen together.  

This is a personal record.  In the past I've managed to get to 50 there, before the males conked out for the day.  

Two questions.  1) Has anyone ever bettered this tally? (Neil Hulme need not apply).  2) Is Brother Betulae having a good year? (I've been quite pleased by numbers in N Wilts, but that population is not a patch on the Shipton Bellinger one).  

The habitat at Shipton Bellinger is green lanes and hedges with abundant sloe on rough MOD-owned grazing land, on chalk, like this -

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Another male nectaring at Grafton

It was a long wait, as the 2mph wind took four hours to bring in the first blue sky to Grafton Wood, on Aug 11th. Shortly afterwards, however, Gillian spotted a male nectaring, opposite the pond area, at around 3pm.

Like Mike, I've observed that WLH and PH seem to be coming down to nectar much more frequently than usual, this year, although I have no idea why. There were three other sightings of males nectaring at various locations around the wood, mainly on hemp agrimony, on the day. Hopefully, the next two days of rain will pass without too much damage, as next week should be good at Grafton.

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Waiting no longer

The first Brown Hairstreaks were seen at Grafton Wood last Thursday: a male and more surprisingly an egg-laying female.  Saw both White-letter Hairstreak and Purple Hairstreak the same day all three nectaring on hemp agrimony and in the case of the male Brown Hairstreak bramble.  Wondered if this might suggest a shortage of aphid honeydew this year.  What has been the experience elsewhere?

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Still waiting in Worcestershire

Although Brown Hairstreaks have already been reported further south we are still awaiting our first sighting in Worcs.  Made my first early morning visit to one of our known assembly trees yesterday but no success so did a Big Butterfly Count instead.  Over the last few years we have always seen our first Brown Hairstreak before the end of July but this year looks as if it is the exception.  It has been a decidedly odd season with a number of species on the late side and it is only now, for example, that Peacocks are beginning to be seen on a regular basis.  Anyway, hopefully not too much longer to wait!

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Eggs Now Hatching

I am fortunate enough to have three Brown Hairstreak eggs in my front hedge here in Crawley, West Sussex. All have survived predation and the first of them hatched this morning (15th April). The egg was south-facing and the larva was located making its way to the nearest leaves. The plant is Cherry Plum (Prunus cerasifera) which has been in leaf for some weeks. I have also been monitoring eggs on nearby Blackthorn where the buds are now just breaking and found another hatched egg (also south-facing). Last year eggs in this area were reported to be hatching on 5th April.

Vince Massimo

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Tagged eggs warning

For the second time we have had tagged eggs removed from one of our Worc nature reserves presumably by a butterfly breeder/collector.  The incident happened at Trench Wood reserve where eggs had been marked ironically to ensure that they were not removed by accident as part of routine ride maintenance.  Over 20 eggs were taken, virtually every single egg laid at Trench Wood this winter!  This follows a similar incident at Grafton Wood back in 2010.  It is pretty appalling to think that there are unscrupulous individuals around that would take eggs from a nature reserve in this way but clearly there are and by publicising the incident we hope that similar incidents can be avoided.  For our own part at West Midlands Butterfly Conservation we shall not be marking any eggs in the future.

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Annual Transect egg count 6th December 2014

Eighteen wonderful volunteers turned up for the count, travelling from far and wide.  Thank you everyone for making such an effort.

The count was low - given that the count the previous year was the highest ever with 651 eggs found on the day along the 500m foreshore transect.

However, the bigger picture shows that 232 is the seventh highest number out of 20 counts, so pretty good overall.

West Williamston SSSI Annual Brown Hairstreak Egg Count 

Sunday December 6^th 2014. 

Area	No	Volunteers	Blkthorn status   previous year	Blackthorn management
000 - 025	19	Steven,  Anne,  John  &  Viv	v good
025 - 050	39	“         “          “            “	v good
B Glade	16	“         “          “            “	good
B Glade 2nd	3	“         “          “            “	ok
050 - 075	11	“         “          “            “	good
075 - 100	7	“         “          “            “	ok
100 - 125	12	David,  Andy,  Ruth  &  Val	poor
125 - 150	3	“        “         “           “	poor
150 - 175	5	“        “         “           “	good
175 - 200	10	“        “         “           “	good
Bracken Patch	8		good
200 - 225	39	Richard, George, Paul, Gareth	v good
225 - 250	35	and Tony	v good
250 - 275	9	“     “     “       “      “	ok
275 - 300	2	“      “     “       “      “	v poor
Shallow Pool	1	David,  Andy,  Ruth  &  Val	poor
300 - 325	4	Nathan,  Kiara,  Alan  &  Nikki	ok
325 - 350	1	“           “          “           “	poor
350 - 375	0	“           “          “           “	v poor
375 - 400	0	“           “          “           “	v poor
400 - 425	5	Nathan, Kiara, Alan & Nikki	poor
425 - 450	2	“          “         “         “	poor
450 - 475	1	“          “         “         “	poor
475 - 500	0	“          “         “         “	poor
Total	232

(NB 1st December 2013 – transect total = 651 …….  end March 2014 overall reserve total = 1,661 eggs.)

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West Williamston Egg Predation Survey – blog no 9 mid November 2014

The big miss-hap, or ‘accidents do happen’

Before the cut …………..

After the cut .....................

Our study site at West Williamston was divided into 2 halves ….. one - an area outside the electric fence consisting of the youngest blackthorn and surveyed (after the first two weeks) by me, and the other - the area between the electric fence and the field boundary - surveyed by David (Redhead) and consisting of 1 to 3 year old blackthorn much denser in nature.

Shortly after the eighth survey session the grass in the Reserve’s top field (where our survey was taking place) was cut as part of planned management. Unfortunately the contractor failed to see the tags marking very young blackthorn in the field on the outer side of the electric fence.  The tags, eggs and blackthorn were almost all lost (eggs right under the fence fortunately avoided the chop).

This was a bit of a disaster from the ‘overwintering egg predation’ survey’s point of view – or my half of it.  David’s half remains safe and intact being located inside the electric fence between it and the tree-line fence.

 On the other hand I have eight satisfying and illuminating week’s worth of data including recounts, recording, and the dates new eggs were found.  The most interesting outcome to me was establishing that eggs found in a ‘triple’ were laid as a pair and then added to days later.  This indicates that there was something special about that particular spot – the small bush was surrounded  by extensive  blackthorn that appeared to be just as suitable in every way.

The study will continue thanks to David’s commitment, his half of the site being intact. 

David has continued his counts into November and from now on the eggs will be re-found between now and the end of April to show which months the greatest predation takes place.

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