The persistent westerly winds which have brought a series of low pressure systems across the Atlantic towards us recently have resulted in many areas becoming saturated although at least the reservoirs are fast approaching overflow level with the latest counts from Severn Trent Water reporting a near 92% capacity across their catchment areas, with the 3 Upper Derwent Reservoirs at 100% and Carsington Water at 75% full. Despite above average temperatures during the first 2 weeks of January 2023, it is somewhat surprising that there have been no further outdoor butterfly sightings recently in the County during any sunny spell as no further hibernators have not been tempted out of their slumber during the last week.

This lack of activity has enabled Pat and I to finish off the verifying and inputting of all the 2021 Derbyshire butterfly data and the total tetrads for each species is shown on the attached Word document – it can be seen that 13 species had increased their overall distribution in the County whilst 20 species had declined in distribution. If we look at the Wall Brown in more detail, you will see that it had a better year in 2021 compared to 2020 – a 9% increase in distribution and a 34% increase in numbers, which is great! I have summarised all the Wall Brown results in the County since 1995 – have a look at the attached excel sheet, which shows its nadir in 2008 with only 37 butterflies seen at 19 locations, but pleasingly it has seen significant increases since then. The top 3 butterfly species showing increases in distribution over 2020 were (surprisingly) Brown Argus (Peak District Race) at 38%, the Painted Lady at 25% and the Silver Washed Fritillary at 20%.The latest information on the Painted Lady suggests that it over-winters even further south than first thought – in subtropical Africa rather than the Atlas Mountains in Morocco .Its journey north is split into 2 distinct arms with the eastern section travelling through Tunisia, Italy, the Balkans and then into the Baltic States whereas the western section travels north through Gibraltar, Portugal, Spain, France and into the UK from where it moves further north into Norway and the Arctic Circle – a total distance of some 10,000 km! The last good year for the species in Derbyshire was 2019 when the butterfly was recorded from 455 tetrads. The other migrant butterfly that can appear much less frequently in the County is the Clouded Yellow and numbers in recent years have been very low – just 12 specimens were  seen in 2022. In fact the migratory Humming Bird Hawk moth was far more common with at least 200 individuals seen in 2022.The last time that any reasonable numbers of Clouded Yellows were seen in Derbyshire was the year 2000 when sightings were made at 62 tetrads.. Interestingly, Jane Rogers emailed me a photo of a Clouded Yellow that was taken by her daughter recently from Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands where good numbers of the species together with Monarchs are still flying at the moment in the heat – a far cry from us here in the UK.

In the meantime, Sheffield & Rotherham Wildlife Trust have come up with a great initiative to plant some Disease Resistant Elms in their area for the White Letter Hairstreak – be great if other wildlife organisations did something similar in the Region – have a look at the link below:-

https://www.wildsheffield.com/elm-initiative/?s=09

We have proved in the Derby area that the White Letter Hairstreak will use Disease Resistant Elms for their lifestyle once the tree has produced flowers – this takes usually between 6 and 10 years, so it is a long term but very important project!

Stay warm during this current cold snap – we are close to the transect season with only two and half months to the 1st of April 2023