76% of British native and visiting Butterflies have declined since 1976
Changes to the British landscape have affected the habitat and food supply that our butterflies need. Destruction of habitat is thought to be the prime cause with changes in agriculture and horticulture coming a close second. These are the main reasons that Britain is not as Butterfly friendly as it was 40 years ago:
A Red Admiral butterfly kept me company whist I sat outside enjoying the sunshine and my mid morning coffee today. The beautiful creature fluttered from plant to plant seeking nectar to drink and occasionally rested on the lawn enjoying the sunshine just like me I guess. The butterfly above is a Peacock and the Red Admiral is below on the top left of the square picture.
One of my plans this year was to attract more Butterflies to our garden. We are very lucky and already have a very wildlife friendly garden with wild creatures spilling in from neighbouring hedgerows, fields and woodlands. For the past 13 years we have planted hedges, gardened organically (zero chemicals) and provided food, fresh water and shelter for insects, birds and mammals. Despite all our efforts we have noticed that the number of visiting Butterflies has been falling each year. Declining numbers of Butterflies seems to be a UK wide problem for a variety of reasons ranging from adverse weather conditions to loss of habitat and food plants for adults and caterpillars.
Happy New Year to You!
I’ve already been thinking about what I’d like for 2017 and as usual I have a long list of places to go, people to see and lots of things I’d like to do. Writing such a huge list always means that I never manage to complete everything on it. Usually that doesn’t worry me at all because it’s easy to carry things over to the following year and I know that sooner or later I’ll make it happen.
We have plans for our garden too. We are planning to rejig a couple of well established borders, remove some old shrubs that are past their best and update a planting scheme or two. My lovely husband will help me. But I’m not kidding myself … I already know that I’ll probably have to carry some less urgent things over until 2018. But there’s something important on my list that just can’t wait.
Have you ever noticed how an everyday activity sometimes turns into a magical event? We live in a small village in the North West of England. We’re just on the edge of the village with our garden stretching out into the surrounding countryside. Apart from traffic passing through on the main street it’s a peaceful place. Just the way we like it. Everyday I make a point of walking to our local post box to send orders on their way to my lovely customers.
It’s Wildlife Wednesday!
My daughter found a bee on the kitchen floor looking bedraggled and weak.
I’ve been skipping about today because the sun is shining and we have gorgeous butterflies in the garden. Butterflies feed on lots of different types of plants but seem to love these nectar rich flowers in particular. They cluster together on our Buddleja shrubs which have thousands of tiny flowers full of nectar.
I’m making a few changes to our garden to encourage butterflies to spend some time here. Many of our butterfly species have falling numbers and that bothers me a great deal. It’s likely that environmental changes such as housing construction and road building plus farming methods and land management have all affected the habitat and food supply that our butterflies need. There’s not much I can do about all of that in the wider environment but I can make some changes here in our own garden which may be useful to them.
This weekend representatives from 195 countries met at the 2015 World Climate Summit in Paris. They reached an historic agreement. In a nutshell their plan is to combat the rapid warming of Earth by switching from fossil fuels to renewable sources of energy. Here are the key elements of the agreement:
Keen garden bloggers have been chatting for the past few weeks about the strangely mild autumn we have had so far. Although it’s nice to be able to get outside without coats there has been an underlying current of concern. What effect will these high temperatures have on our garden plants and the creatures who depend on them for food and habitat?
A press release by the RHS indicates that we are right to be worried about environmental changes affecting our planet. We all know that populations of plants and animals are in decline to such an extent that some are in danger of becoming extinct.