2007 Magazine Version 05.indd - Butterfly Conservation Warwickshire

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Contents The First Ten Years by Margaret Vickery Ryton Wood Meadows 2006 Report by Mike Slater and Alan Prior A Tale Of A Pale Mottled Willow by Peter Thompson One September Morning at Highlands in 2006 by Ray Healey New Warwickshire Branch Website by Steven Cheshire Editors’ Review of 2006 by Debbie Hibbitt and Steven Cheshire Holly Blue and Other Observations at Highlands in 2005 by Ray Healey My Speckled Wood Baby by Mo Parr Solihull Environmental Day by Val Weston A Flying Start for Brownfield Butterflies and Moths in the Midlands by Jane Ellis How One Woman’s Gift Will Make A World Of Difference Conserving Butterflies & Moths at a Landscape Level by Jenny Joy John Carter Records Geranium Bronze in Warwickshire by Steven Cheshire Welches Meadow, Leam Valley Guided Walk by Phil Parr 2006 Rugby Area Reports by Phil Parr Species Spotlight - The Clouded Yellow Guided Walks in the Rugby Area by Phil Parr Warwickshire Garden Butterfly Survey 2005/6 by Margaret Vickery Clearwings and Furry Gnomes by Keith Warmington 2006 Butterfly Highlights by Keith Warmington Immigrant Larger Moths in Warwickshire 2006 by David Brown Warwickshire VC38 Macro Moth Report 2006 by David Brown Warwickshire Branch Committee Contacts 3 7 10 11 12 13 16 17 18 19 22 23 25 26 27 30 31 33 35 37 39 42 43 Views expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of the Editors or of Butterfly Conservation either locally or nationally. This magazine is published by the Warwickshire Branch of Butterfly Conservation. It is a non-profit company registered in England No: 2206468 and a registered Charity No 254937. Head Office and membership enquiries to: Butterfly Conservation, Manor Yard, East Lulworth, Wareham, Dorset, BH20 5QP t: 0870 7744309 e: info@butterfly-conservation.org w: http://www.butterfly-conservation.org Copyright © 2007 All Rights Reserved All photographic images and text remain the copyright of the original creators as indicated. Cover Photograph Clouded Yellow at Coughton Court, Alcester © Steven Cheshire 2007 The Editors welcome written and/or artwork contributions on all aspects of Lepidoptera in Warwickshire and its’ surrounding areas. Contributions must be neatly hand-written or supplied on disk or by e-mail as a Microsoft Word document. Photographs and illustrations in both colour and B&W may also be submitted separately to the text either as hard copy or digitally as high resolution .tiff or .jpeg files. All contributions are subject to editing for clarity, correctness, convention and space available. Whilst all reasonable care will be taken of manuscripts and illustrative material, neither the Editors, nor Butterfly Conservation can be held responsible for any loss or damage during custody or return. Contributions should be posted to: Steven Cheshire & Debbie Hibbitt Editors - Warwickshire BC Magazine 85 Grasmere Crescent, Nuneaton, Warwickshire, CV11 6EB or sent by e-mail to: steven@steven-cheshire.co.uk or debbie@creativebynature.co.uk 2 Butterfly Conservation Warwickshire Branch Magazine 2007
The First Ten Years by Margaret Vickery It hardly seems possible that we are ten years old! Reading through a decade of newsletters I was struck by the way that Butterfly Conservation and the branch have evolved over the years. In particular there was much enthusiasm and voluntary effort during the early years in a wide variety of branch activities. This has narrowed considerably to the point where now all our efforts are devoted almost entirely to saving and improving Warwickshire habitat for butterflies and moths. Once it was almost exclusively nature reserves, now our efforts are spread throughout the wider countryside of the county, wherever there is, or could be, a colony of lepidoptera. Once we had small parties of eager volunteers battling against the all-pervading “scrub” on Sunday mornings. Although a few of these rare species do still exist, these days it is more likely that contractors with chain saws and bulldozers are doing the work. The reduction in voluntary effort is as much due to the stricter health and safety laws as any lack of support by members. However, recording is one area in which voluntary effort has increased considerably. In our first newsletter Mike Slater made a plea for more Warwickshire recorders as we only had 15. The push to cover the whole county for the Millennium Atlas resulted in around 200 recorders taking part, more than the total membership of the branch! This has now evened out at between 50 and 80 per year. Warwickshire was once part of the West Midlands branch, an area which also covered Gloucestershire, Worcestershire, Herefordshire, Shropshire, Staffordshire and West Midlands County. In the days when the society was small and members few, such a large area was not too difficult to administrate, but as we grew it became apparent in the 1990s that a more local approach was called for. So county groups were set up with their own committees to concentrate on their own concerns. The overall policy and financial management remained in the hands of the West Midlands. However it was not long before two of these county group committees felt they had the experience to run their own branches. So first Gloucestershire and then Warwickshire left the West Midlands to become branches in their own right. This move was welcomed by the national society, whose policy was to have a branch in every county. Warwickshire, however has always remained part of the West Midlands region. Our first branch (acting) committee meeting took place in my living room in the autumn of 1996 and we made the momentous decision to inaugurate the new Warwickshire branch on 1st January 1997 (although the inaugural meeting was not held until 1st March that year). At this meeting Mike Slater was appointed acting chairman/branch organiser and conservation officer and I took on the duties of treasurer, newsletter editor and membership secretary. We decided to keep our boundaries to the old county of Warwickshire and thus the new branch covered Coventry, Solihull and Sutton Coldfield as well as parts of eastern Birmingham. We wrote to BC members living in these regions as well as in Warwickshire explaining our reasons for setting up our own branch and asking for support. At our inaugural meeting in March we had 50 members, enough to make the branch viable. Other members joined the committee and I most gratefully first shared and then completely off-loaded the newsletter editorship to Keith Warmington. 3 Butterfly Conservation Warwickshire Branch Magazine 2007
Page 1: Butterfly Conservation Magazine War
Page 5 and 6: utterflies and their habitats. Rath
Page 7 and 8: Ryton Wood Meadows Warwickshire Bra
Page 9 and 10: Apart from the Lobster, other macro
Page 11 and 12: One September Morning at Highlands
Page 13 and 14: Photograph © Debbie Hibbitt 2007 P
Page 15 and 16: The highlight of July was a day tri
Page 17 and 18: My garden (wilderness more like it)
Page 19 and 20: A Flying Start for Brownfield Butte
Page 21 and 22: A key outcome from the meeting is t
Page 23 and 24: Countdown 2010 Conserving Butterfli
Page 25 and 26: Therefore, in future a brief summar
Page 27 and 28: 2006 Rugby Area Reports by Phil Par
Page 29 and 30: Photograph © Phil Parr 2007 Above:
Page 31 and 32: Guided Walks in the Rugby Area by P
Page 33 and 34: Warwickshire Garden Butterfly Surve
Page 35 and 36: Clearwings And Furry Gnomes by Keit
Page 37 and 38: 2006 Butterfly Highlights - A Trium
Page 39 and 40: Immigrant Larger Moths in Warwicksh
Page 41 and 42: 2nd August, Earlsdon, Coventry, (D
Page 43 and 44: Warwickshire Branch Committee Marga

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