The first words written in the 1991 diary were, Destined to be the greatest summer of my life. Needless to say, I had misread the signs (if signs they were), for the year brought a dreadful summer. Some butterflies, of course, did well, notably some of the species whose larvae feed on grasses, for the grasses grew spectacularly well after two drought summers, and the associated larvae benefited. Moreover, my life was in inner turmoil, torn between being hefted to Selborne and the desire to explore wider afield, to develop new heartlands; torn between fighting for nature conservation locally or nationally; torn between different options for developing a career and supporting a family. Above all, I was torn between heart and head. There was little hope there, for as Dylan Thomas deftly argues in his poem ‘Should lanterns shine’, heart and head both lead helplessly. Time creates these issues (whether they are problems or opportunities is secondary), and time alone will solve them.
Winter was dire. It included a twelve-day sunless period of hateable gloom in late January. Seasonal affective disorder (SAD), from which many British lovers of Nature suffer to a greater or even greater extent, was just being discovered. Then it snowed – 10 centimetres of the stuff in Hampshire, offering excellent tobogganing for a week. Eventually, winter ended, only for spring to relapse after a promising beginning. Brimstones opened the butterfly season, taking to the air en masse on March 7th. My first danced over gravestones at St Lawrence's Church in Alton, symbolising what?
All four of the butterfly species that hibernate annually appeared in good numbers, hardly surprising as they had been numerous the previous late summer and autumn. Then, an unusually prolific hatch of Holly Blue and Orange-tip commenced in mid-April. I watched a spectacular emergence of male Holly Blues on April 13th, from profuse Ivy growths on tall Ash trunks at Blacknest at the northern end of the East Hampshire Hangers, just west of Alice Holt Forest. One by one they began to search the self-same Ivy patches for emerging females. Now that's decisiveness and clarity of purpose for you! But spring was late, with April failing to produce either a Cuckoo or a Swallow, for migrant birds were held up by a cold northerly airflow which persisted well into May. Holly Blues defied the weather and continued to appear in even better numbers than they had during the great spring of 1990, but gradually the adverse weather conquered them, for May was dull and chilly, though dry. Slowly but surely the promise was squeezed out of the spring of 1991, and the Holly Blues and all they stood for succumbed.
There were some memorable days, of course, and adventures into new heartlands. At the end of May I explored, for the first time, the sea combe and undercliff system around the exquisite village of Branscombe on the south coast of Devon, close to the Dorset border. Now this is Wood White country, but with a difference. In England this most fragile-looking of our butterflies is strongly associated with grassy woodland rides and other sheltered grassland habitats. Here it occurs along a crumbling sandstone cliff system, and on the adjoining chalk slopes. Even the coast of the English Riviera seems too exposed for this butterfly, but there is shelter for it here and there, along the paths, in combes and in the slumps and hollows of old landslips. There were also abandoned potato fields studded along the slumped cliff system, for Branscombe was once famous for its new potatoes. Those fields, allotments effectively, are now reverting to scrubland. The butterfly breeds in all these situations, and along the margins of rough hillside fields, where Bracken and brambles encroach over sagging barbed wire. The best breeding grounds I found were where Bird's-foot Trefoil was growing through low Privet scrub in an area where a minor landslip had occurred a few years previously. There the females were busily laying their eggs, on foodplants straggling through developing scrub. Soon, of course, the scrub would win through and the butterfly would have to breed elsewhere. Best of all, Wood Whites were feeding hungrily on Purple Gromwell flowers, a rare and most lovely plant that grows along the coastal paths. And there were colonies of Pearl-bordered Fritillaries in Bracken stands along the rough field edges, and Small Pearl-bordered Fritillaries in a damp hollow full of Marsh Violets. With butterflying, there are many days, many excursions one would love to relive, and this was one.
If May was dull, June was duller. It made its way into the history books for being the cloudiest June in England and Wales since 1929. Butterflies tried to sit it out, but one by one they failed. There were a few good days. One, in early June, was memorable for a survey expedition to woodland on the Beaulieu River, close to the New Forest coast. Here were vistas into the New Forest of old, before mass coniferisation. Historic places possess cracks in time which allow us to peep into their past. The broad Bracken-filled rides amongst oak forest planted to provide timber for the Navy offered up colonies of Pearl-bordered Fritillaries and even a relic colony of the Duke of Burgundy, based on Primrose. The latter was especially important, for the Duke was on the point of extinction in the Forest, and was feared lost from the Crown lands. These were indeed the last Burgundies I saw in the New Forest – small and dark they were, true forest dwellers. I returned in high summer, hoping beyond hope to turn up the High Brown Fritillary there, but found only a few pockets of suitable-looking breeding habitat, though a worn Painted Lady female was seen laying her eggs on Marsh Cudweed along a bare track, an unusual foodplant for this butterfly.
There was a journey back into places buried in my personal past, Lambert's Castle and Pilsdon Pen near Crewkerne. I discovered a thriving colony of Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary in the bog below the Castle. Then a few years later the Marsh Fritillary colonised, providing a welcome example of a rare butterfly colonising somewhere new. My last visit to Pilsdon Pen, a brooding hill fort straight out of the darkest moments of a Thomas Hardy novel, had been on the day of my father's cremation (which I was deemed too young to attend). I was in safe hands on this return, being accompanied by William Keighley, the kindest of all National Trust wardens, a mild man whose relationship with the places in his care was based on love and understanding. Eggardon Hill, another of the west Dorset hill forts, this time on the Chalk, was discovered, and known for the first time. We also visited Bind Barrow, a low hill of Tor-grass on the coast near Burton Bradstock, and the westernmost site for the Lulworth Skipper. William and I found several larvae there, within loosely spun ‘tents’ on broad leaf blades in tall prominent tussocks of Tor-grass. These are quite easy to find if you spy out vigorous, semi-isolated tussocks and then look for the distinctive larval feeding marks either side of the larval ‘tent’.
Up on the Bristol Channel coast, I checked out the colony of Glanville Fritillary at Sand Point, above Weston Super Mud. The butterfly had been kindly but unofficially introduced to the south-facing slope of this Carboniferous Limestone promontory in 1983 and had persisted, somehow. It had become quite a dilemma for the National Trust, for butterfly enthusiasts wanted the butterfly to flourish there, despite the limited size and varying quality of the habitat. The practice of moving butterflies around, to unoccupied suitable-looking habitat, is one of the many manifestations of people's love for butterflies, and an understandable reaction to their decline.
June worsened, eventually despairing of itself and giving up the ghost. One of its victims was the small colony of the Small Blue on Noar Hill, which all but failed in 1991, simply on account of the weather. Habitat conditions for it there were good, I had made sure of that. The cold dull June also meant that the midsummer butterflies emerged late – a trip down to Dartmoor in early July found that the High Brown Fritillary had scarcely started to emerge there, and also that many of the butterfly's Bracken stands had become too grassy, unsuitable for breeding. Elsewhere in Devon, I saw the last High Brown Fritillary ever seen on the National Trust's Arlington estate in west Exmoor, a victim of agricultural intensification. Eventually I discovered, or rather rediscovered, a large population on the Bracken-infested slopes above New Bridge in the Dart valley, running upstream to Aish Tor. Incredibly, there was only one previous record for the butterfly here – it seemed that no one had actually expl
ored the area for butterflies, despite the presence of a large riverside car park and tourist information centre below at New Bridge. This turned out to be one of the strongest High Brown Fritillary populations in the UK.
July wobbled, alternating between weather moods. The Purple Emperor season came, stuttered and went. The best I saw of it was in Hartley Wood, near Oakhanger in East Hampshire, where several males were flying over thicket-stage conifer plantations choked with sallows. The same plantations had held Pearl-bordered Fritillaries and huge colonies of Small Pearl-bordered Fritillaries in the mid- to late 1970s. A few years later the woods changed hands; the new owners slaughtered the sallows and proceeded to run the woods for an intensive commercial pheasant shoot, and tolerated no visitors. At that point my relationship with Hartley Wood ended. It had fallen into darkness.
August proved to be the best of the summer months, though not without spells of adverse weather. The second brood of the Holly Blue appeared in fair numbers, though way down on the spring showing. The butterfly was now spiralling into decline. A few days on the south Devon coast in early August picked up a sizeable immigration of Small White on Bolt Head, west of the Kingsbridge estuary, and a similar influx of Large White around Prawle Point, a little way to the east. Oddly, the two species had come in separately.
The most wonderful place discovered during 1991 was the steep east-facing downland slopes of High and Over, above the Cuckmere valley south of Alfriston in East Sussex. This was part of a new National Trust acquisition that year, the gloriously named Frog Firle Farm, purchased under Enterprise Neptune funding. We did not realise just how rich it was for wildlife until after it had been acquired, so the discovery of thriving colonies of Silver-spotted Skipper, Grayling, Adonis Blue and Chalkhill Blue on the downland, and important Diptera and dragonfly populations in the river valley, came as a most pleasant surprise. At the time, Silver-spotted Skipper was only known from a single site in East Sussex, Deepdene, diagonally across the Cuckmere from High and Over. Presumably the butterfly had colonised from there during the hot summers of 1989 or 1990. Frog Firle also produced a Painted Lady invasion, on August 29th. They were taking nectar from, and depositing eggs on, Red Star-thistle, a rare non-native annual that looks like a cross between a thistle and a knapweed and which is reputed to have been accidentally imported in mud on the boots of Napoleonic prisoners. It is known only from that part of the East Sussex downs.
All summer I had been delaying a monumental decision, whether to stay in Hampshire and carry on as a self-employed ecologist, as economic recession loomed, or to take up the offer of a full-time post with the National Trust, with the glorious title of Advisor on Nature Conservation. Heart said the former, head said the latter. One choice offered freedom in Nature coupled with the insecurity that accompanies it, the other the potential to get to the roots of some nature conservation issues, be part of a movement, and something approximating to security for the family. The job offer was dependent on moving house to be based from an office in Cirencester. For the first and only time in my life head won over heart. The wrench was horrific, particularly from Noar Hill. I have missed Noar Hill every day of my life since leaving Hampshire in March 1992, for my relationship with the place then slowly broke; the deep cynefin I had developed for the Selborne area shattered into a myriad fragments, each one piercing deeply.
A job is, of course, largely what you make it, and this was definitely a job of a lifetime, which meant it had to be for a lifetime too. The opportunities to help butterflies, their habitats and wildlife in general were enormous, and irresistible. But it was the impact on my personal relationship with Nature which mattered most, and that was exchanged for a relationship with nature conservation – and there is a difference. Crucially, most people seeking to work in nature conservation do so in order to develop their personal relationships with Nature. However, today's nature conservation profession scarcely enables that, with its obsession with money, politics, targets and systems – not to mention business meetings.
Once the decision had been made the agony intensified, for now there was no going back. Gradually I said farewell to each dear place around Selborne, each vista, each gap between trees, each sunken lane where Robins nest in twisted tree roots, each mossy tree stump, each sunset. It was as if I was going off to war. Worse, it felt as though the place was pushing me out. Places do that: they can suddenly boot you out – though perhaps other places, as unheard voices, are calling?
The year started well, with the driest January since 1837 and then a mild, racy February. My first butterflies of 1992 – Comma, Brimstone and Peacock, all within a whirligig minute on March 4th – were seen in a meadow destined to go under the A34 Newbury bypass. It was an apt experience for a nature conservationist. So 1992 was only the second butterfly season to open with a Comma, after 1975 – which had also been a year of monumental personal change. Then, forty years after my father's death, the family moved to Gloucestershire, where he had grown up. In a way we had come back. The first lesson, though, was how much cloudier the climate is in Gloucestershire, especially in spring.
The Janus-eyed Peacock was the butterfly of the spring of 1992. Males established territories in every sheltered sunny spot. A return visit to Noar Hill at the start of May, as the Duke of Burgundies were beginning to emerge, produced the highest count of spring Peacocks recorded there. Then, during June, Peacock larvae abounded in many of the nation's sunnier nettle patches. The Peacock went on to become Butterfly of the Year, for a huge summer brood materialised, assisted by warm June weather and a glorious July.
A wave of new places was encountered, near and far. In the Cotswolds, effort concentrated on assessing the status of the Duke of Burgundy, stimulated by a few fascinating days back in 1985. During the 1970s and 1980s the butterfly had enjoyed a boom era in the Cotswolds. I arrived there at the end of that era, when neglected grasslands were becoming too rough even for this long-grass specialist, and as the conservation backlash against this neglect was gaining momentum. There were still some good colonies, notably on the National Trust's Rodborough Common near Stroud, and at Cranham Common, Edge Common and Juniper Hill near Painswick. But everywhere the writing was on the wall for this little butterfly. One terribly isolated colony on the Trust's Sherborne estate near Northleach said it all. The colony was found in a pocket of limestone grassland where planted trees had failed, and was surrounded by miles and miles of intensive arable farmland. Keeping small, isolated fragments in suitable condition for a demanding butterfly is a massive challenge. We managed it, only to lose the colony during a series of rotten springs. Pearl-bordered Fritillaries were discovered in Cirencester Park Woods, and also on several of the limestone grassland commons around Stroud. The places were new, but the players familiar.
Further afield, each trip to somewhere new produced a revelation. A visit to Lewesdon Hill, the highest point in west Dorset, in mid-May coincided with the arrival of immigrant Red Admirals and Painted Ladies. The males set up territories in glades in the woodland there, perched appealingly on Bluebell flowers, and behaved despicably towards each other. The scarp slope of the Mendips between Crook Peak and Cheddar revealed sizeable colonies of Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary and Grizzled Skipper, and some large Bracken stands which appeared to be in ideal condition for High Brown Fritillary. I could not wait to return during the High Brown season. The downs above Wrotham in north-west Kent, above the noisy M20, produced one of the best flights of Common Blue I have ever seen – seemingly because the foodplant, Bird's-foot Trefoil, had grown exceptionally well where arable fields had been sown with a conservation seed mix in an effort to restore chalk downland. A series of near-derelict orchards in a valley at Brockhampton in north Herefordshire revealed a colony of Wood Whites. The farm tenant here was elderly, merely tending a few beef cattle and sheep and leaning gently on the land. A little while later his son took over and the Wood Whites vanished. Such can be the difference between an old man's hand on the land, and that of a young ma
n.
The inevitable burn-out occurred in early June. We were going to run an ecology training course in a hotel at Newby Bridge, at the southern end of Windermere, assembling on Sunday evening. Early that morning I set out for a day's butterflying in south Lakeland, visiting several of the limestone hills, where Pearl-bordered Fritillaries abounded and Small Pearl-bordered Fritillary and Northern Brown Argus were beginning their flight seasons. The day ended with a superb evening flight of Green Hairstreak on Meathop Moss, by Witherslack, where groups of up to eight were seen spiralling together over birch scrub. Later, they ascended into Scots Pine trees to roost. The first Large Heaths of the year were emerging, and all was well with the world. The following day, which was dull and lifeless, we had to climb up one of the Coniston fells, leaden-footed in my case. Not even the discovery of a little colony of Small Pearl-bordered Fritillaries in a boggy flush 220 metres up managed to raise my energy levels. That evening there was a lecture on multivariate analysis, and sleep blissfully descended.
June steadily bettered itself. At midsummer the Lakeland high fells called, and they meant business. The National Trust owns or leases most of the mountain tops haunted by the Mountain Ringlet. At the time next to nothing was known about this lovely dark butterfly – where it occurred, how it was doing, what made it tick – that sort of thing – on my patch, on my watch; it was time for action. Most butterfly enthusiasts make the effort to see the Mountain Ringlet maybe two or three times in a lifetime, visiting a couple of renowned localities where access is relatively easy, but in the early 1990s the species began to generate some interest. Amongst that disparate but coalescing body of people was John Hooson, the National Trust's ecologist for the Lake District. Hooson should have been born a mountain goat, for he will seize any excuse to ascend any mountain, preferably at speed. The secret of working with such people is to insist on leading the way, so that they move at your (much slower and more rational) pace. Hooson and I spent two glorious days up on the Langdale Pikes, seeking the butterfly and asking questions of it. I wanted to follow the females, and discover where they lay their eggs, as an entry point towards understanding the insect's ecology. Hooson, an ace botanist, wanted to look closely at the vegetation characteristics of breeding areas. We covered a vast area, from Blea Rigg to Sargeant Man on the first day, and on the second day up the Mickleham Beck valley, up Stake Gill, over boggy Langdale Combe, up Mansey Pike, Buck Pike and Rosset Pike to Angle Tarn, and then to Tongue Head and Ore Gap, and to the summit of Bow Fell, before descending past Three Tarns and White Stones, down The Band and out through Stool End Farm. Those names rightly imply exhaustion. The Langdale Pikes are not for the fainthearted.
In Pursuit of Butterflies Page 23