Conservation Work for Butterflies
Written by Alan Jones
16 th March 2012
Living at the tops of trees, the White-letter Hairstreak (Satyrium w-album) is one of Derby's less obvious resident butterflies. With its caterpillars eating elm flowers and elm leaves, it has declined considerably in number since the 1970s because of Dutch elm disease. A new wave of the disease could arrive at any time and kill many of the remaining mature elms in Derby - and the City's White-letter Hairstreak colonies with them.
As a UK priority species for conservation, the White-letter Hairstreak is picked out by the Lowland Derbyshire Local Biodiversity Action Plan as deserving special attention. To survive it needs elm trees, but not just any variety of elm tree: its caterpillars have to like it, it must flower and be in leaf at the time of year that the caterpillars need to eat, and it must be resistant to Dutch elm disease. The Sapporo Autumn Gold Elm variety meets all of these requirements, and it's a race against time to get enough of them established in and around Derby.
Early March 2012, a group of volunteers helped the Elms for Hairstreaks Project by plantig young Sapporo Autumn Gold elm trees in several areas of the Darley and Nutwood Local Nature Reserve. Some of these newly planted elms are within a few hundred metres of a known colony of White letter hairstreaks,and it is hoped they will provide a lifeline for the butterfly.
Above: Bran Acres, Sharon Bartlett, Alan Jones and Phil Bartlett
A word from Keith Dodd:
Thanks to all of you for helping with the elm tree planting (including John Barker not in this photo). It will be interesting to see how well they do over the next few years.
