Butterflies in the Wider Countryside

There is growing acknowledgement of the importance of biodiversity in the wider countryside. Butterfly populations are an excellent way to monitor the health of an environment.

UK butterfly monitoring currently focuses on nature reserves and butterfly-rich places. This has lead to a lack of monitoring in vast areas of the wider countryside. These areas include farmland, plantation woodland, uplands and urban green spaces

The UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme, run by Butterfly Conservation and the Centre for Hydrology and Ecology, has developed a new scheme to gauge the changing abundance of widespread species in the general countryside.

70% of the UK’s land is in agricultural use. It is essential that butterflies in these areas are monitored to gauge the health our countryside.

Contact

Email your comments or queries to Dr. Katie Cruickshanks

Funders

The project is funded by a Defra-led consortium of government agencies and runs parallel to UKBMS transect monitoring, and to the Butterflies for the New Millennium distribution records project.