Annually I record the flowers our earliest of Butterflies nectar from in spring.

The Small Tortoiseshell Agalis urticae prefers Dandelions Taraxacum agg, and the early Labiate, Red dead Nettle Lamium purpureum. I have even seen the Small Tortoiseshell attempt to lay eggs on Stinging Nettle Urtica dioica even before mating with another emerging male, so on emergence the butterfly has the urge to lay eggs before death.

Sadly hibernation can be a killer for our Nymphalids like the Small Tortoiseshell, as here in Beccles Eileen and I saw up to six Small Tortoiseshells and five Peacocks Inachis io, flapping like mad trying to get through the glass of a derelict shop. It was pitiful to watch and although we tried to find the owner to save the butterflies the insects lay dead on the window sill a few days later.

The Peacock uses Dandelions as a regular nectaring plant as well, on the marshes at least the Willow Salix caprea. I have as yet to see any Small Tortoiseshells or any other species visit the flowers. Of course most of these flowers that the butterflies turn two are perpetually flowering so it is not instinct but desperation that these plants will be a nectar source. Later as the second brood emerges there is a much grander feast and the butterflies will choose the most promising of flowers, the ones showing ultra violet light and they seem to chose the best ones by flying around until they settle. Who takes the lead is unknown but they soon attract the other species. Of course the most common and fragrant of plant is Buddlija davidii A summer flowering shrub from china. Our shrub is visited daily in the summer and I know that these butterflies are migrants as one day there may be 50 then the next half that number which shows the insects move further on after stopping off for a sweet lunch.

The Whites as yet mentioned here are more cosmopolitan in tastes due in part to the late emergence and vastly different flowering plants they can visit.

So you see there are uses for our perpetual and early flowering plants and they are soon hunted out by emerging butterflies.

Of interest to me was a Peacock found by my parents that had hibernated under their wood pile. My mother told me that they could hear the butterfly’s wings hissing as it pumped up enough energy to escape its winter lair. They reported how fascinating the experience had been for them.

Colin Jacobs
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becclesnaturalist.blogspot.com