Families in Oxfordshire are being invited to work off those Christmas mince pies and see in the New Year searching for rare butterfly eggs.
For the last ten years, Butterfly Conservation’s Upper Thames Branch have been organising ‘New Year’s Day Egg Hunts’ to monitor the local population of Brown Hairstreak butterflies.
It is the largest and brightest of the UK’s five native hairstreaks, with rich, dark chocolate-brown upperwings and an orange ‘tail’. The females have a bright band of golden-orange across their forewings and both sexes have an orange-yellow underside, with white ‘hairstreak’ lines across both wings.
Despite its beauty and a flight period lasting from June until September, this butterfly is rarely seen. Adults spent the majority of their lives high up in treetops, with the females only descending to feed and lay tiny white eggs.
Chairman of the Upper Thames Branch, Nick Bowles, said: “The eggs are very small, but once you know what you’re looking for, you begin to spot them quite quickly. This is a unique way to celebrate the New Year and we teach all newcomers about what they’re looking for and how to search for them.
“It’s almost like a treasure hunt and the kids love it, but as well as being great fun, it’s also contributing to the conservation of this beautiful, elusive butterfly.”
Although the Brown Hairstreak is rare in some areas, in Oxfordshire Nick said numbers have been growing: “This is why it is more important than ever to monitor their numbers. If we can find out why they are doing so well here, we can understand how to safeguard the butterfly for the future. It is already facing threats to its habitat locally because the eggs and caterpillar are found on low hedges, which are often cut back or removed entirely to create more open spaces.”
The ‘New Year’s Day Egg Hunt’ is taking place at Otmoor near Beckley, a site managed by the RSPB. They have been working in collaboration with Butterfly Conservation, agreeing to plant more hedges if volunteers from the Upper Thames Branch carry out annual surveys on the butterfly’s progress.
If you would like to go to the free event and help with the conservation of the Brown Hairstreak, you can FIND OUT MORE information on our Events Page, including directions to Otmoor Reserve.
If you are attending please contact the event leader, Dave Wilton, preferably by e-mail to: [email protected] or by texting a message or calling: 07751 472004.