Britain: butterflies and bees decline

The BBC reports:

UK butterfly species down to 56

Only 56 butterfly species now remain in Britain as others have fallen victim to disappearing habitat, a charity says.

The Butterfly Conservation charity said urban sprawl, modern farming techniques and lack of woodland management had all played their part in habitat loss.

Hertfordshire has lost the most species – 17 – in the past century, with Bedfordshire, Suffolk and Lincolnshire having lost 15 each.

The list has been published ahead of the first Save Our Butterflies week. …

The species that has suffered most county extinctions is the High Brown Fritillary.

It is found at only a fifth of the locations it was 40 years ago and is now seen in only eight British counties.

In the UK and The Netherlands, bees are also in decline.

December 2010. The Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust have purchased a critical missing piece of Crowle Moor Nature Reserve. Crowle Moor, together with Hatfield and Thorne Moors over the border in Yorkshire, are all that remains of the vast complex of moor, bog and fen that once surrounded the head of the Humber estuary and included much of Lincolnshire’s Isle of Axholme: here.

March 2011. Herts and Middlesex Wildlife Trust will be able to offer even more protection to Hertfordshire’s wildlife after acquiring Thorley Wash from the Environment Agency, a 40 acre site just south of Bishop’s Stortford. The Trust has also just secured a long lease on Waterford Heath near Hertford, which means wildlife like the scarce grizzled skipper and purple hairstreak butterflies has a safe haven for at least the next 85 years: here.

August 2011: A colony of rare butterflies has been discovered at a new site on the outskirts of Glasgow. The purple hairstreaks were found in Shaw Wood in Thornly Park, Paisley. The discovery could prove important as the butterfly, although widespread in parts of England, is far less common in Scotland: here.

Queen of Spain Fritillary photos: here.