Butterfly and moth migration

Butterflies and moths, which often seem to flutter or bumble about in a haphazard way, are capable of long-distance migration.

The Monarch butterfly is perhaps the best-known example. In North America each year millions of Monarchs fly south from the northern states and Canada to their overwintering sites in Mexico and California.

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The scale of this migration is amazing.

A 3000 mile journey is certainly impressive for an insect the size of your palm.

But even more startling, none of the butterflies making the journey have undertaken it before.

Yet they fly unerringly to the same winter roosts that their grandparents or great-grandparents used the previous year.

Many of our familiar butterflies and moths migrate. Some such as the Red Admiral, Painted Lady and Clouded Yellow butterflies and the Humming-bird Hawk-moth and Silver-Y moth recolonise Britain and Ireland every spring, as migrants from southern Europe or even North Africa.

They breed here in summer, raising generations which then return south or typically perish when winter begins.

But climate change has meant that Red Admirals in particular are now surviving our winters in increasing numbers.

A huge range of moths migrate here regularly.

The Humming-bird Hawk-moth, which you can help us monitor with BBC World on the Move, looks like a Humming-bird as it hovers to nectar at flowers.

The Convolvulus Hawk-moth can measure 12cm across.

Migration also brings rare or new butterflies and moths to our shores, which attract considerable interest among recorders and the public alike. Since the year 2000, over 20 migrant moths have been recorded for the first time ever in Britain and a few of these have become established.

There is much that we still don't know and Butterfly Conservation needs your help to track the migration of the Humming-bird Hawk-moth and Painted Lady butterfly from Africa to the UK in 2008. Log your own sightings and see where these species have already been spotted.

For more information about some of our migrant butterflies and day-flying moths download a factsheet or follow the links below:

• Clouded Yellow
• Humming-bird Hawk-moth
• Monarch
• Painted Lady
• Red Admiral
• Silver-Y