Early Butterflies Monday 16th March 2020

Despite the still very changeable weather butterflies are already making an appearance, a little bit of warmth in the sunny spells is encouraging them to emerge either from hibernation as in the case of Small Tortoiseshell and Brimstone while others will have overwintered as pupae either on the ground or attached to plants tucked away from the prying eyes of hungry birds and rodents.

Small Tortoiseshell

Brimstone

On Friday whilst working with a group of volunteers at the entrance to Pembrey Country Park I happened to glance down and saw the unmistakable outline of a "blue" butterfly.
closer examination revealed that it was a freshly emerged Holly Blue. At the time I just took a photo and warned everyone to watch out for the butterfly, which once shown where it was sitting everyone did.

Freshly emerged female Holly Blue

Thinking it may be too early for the Holly Blue to put in an appearance I did some checking, the records show that it usually emerges in the first week of April!!! so this one is at least two weeks earlier than the average.

An interesting butterfly which has two broods each year the first in spring and the second in summer. The primary foodplants for the larvae (caterpillars) include, unsurprisingly, Holly, Ivy, Brambles, Spindle, Dogwood and Gorse, all of these plants are occur along the Llanelli coastline with the first four in abundance at Pembrey Country Park.

Holly Blue

For those interested in learning more about UK butterflies this is a very useful website,

https://www.ukbutterflies.co.uk/index.php