Privacy Statement

Butterfly Conservation East Midlands will be were at..

Many thanks to all those members who helped on the East Midlands Stand at the Global Bird Fair. It was a very successful three days with Christine getting up at 4am to collect moths for the event each morning. We met some old and new members from around the country and did a lot of talking!

Many thanks to Christine, Max, Mel, Margaret, Geoff, Sylvia, John, Steve and Eliot for all their help.

VACANCY

Derbyshire Conservation Officer

The East Midlands Branch is looking for a new Conservation Officer for Derbyshire.

This is a volunteer role which requires knowledge of what is required to protect and conserve sites and habitats for butterflies and moths. Help is available from the retiring Conservation Officer and other members of the Committee. If you think this rewarding role might be of interest to you, please email Jim Steele at jim_steele@btinernet.com who will be pleased to discuss the role with you. You will also be required to join the East Midlands Branch Committee which requires two meetings (usually in Derbyshire) a year. This is an important role – a Conservation Officer significantly enhances our ability to conserve our butterflies and moths.

Green Hairstreak Species Action Plan.

Green Hairstreak SAP

Just launched (early April 2022). Thanks to Chris Jackson, Emma Gilbert, Melanie Penson and Steve Mathers for all their hard work with this.

Presentations from the 2021 AGM held in March 2022 at Ravenshead.

Grizzled Skippers

An update by Chris Jackson

Clearwing Project

East Midlands Clearwing & Forester Project by Melanie Penson

Notts Butterfly Review 2021 by Steve Mathers

Butterfly Conservation has developed a trial methodology to survey for Purple Hairstreaks

which are under recorded on conventional transects. Even if you don't plan to undertake a transect, this makes interesting reading and gives clues as to when and how you might find these elusive butterflies.

BIG Butterfly Count 2022

DECIDE and MyDecide

Butterfly Conservation is a partner in a new project with the UK's Centre for Ecology and Hydrology.

DECIDE aims to encourage targeted recording of those areas where the data available is currently deficient, making the computer models that produce Species Distribution Maps, uncertain.

DECIDE currently focuses on butterflies and moths with maps showing where new records will have most influence on improving species distribution models for these groups. In other words, the maps show where your recording efforts will be most valuable.

Clearwing and Forester Project

Melanie Penson has produced a detailed document on the results to date, with the methodology and objectives in her study of the status of these elusive moths.

Click to Download(48Kb)

AGM and Members Day

Sunday March 20th 2022

2021 AGM Minutes

Thank you to everyone who attended the Branch AGM on Sunday 20th March.

It was a very enjoyable meeting with excellent talks by Chris Jackson (Notts CC) on the Grizzled Skipper Project and Melanie Penson (Notts/Leics Conservation Officer) on the Clearwing and Forester Project. Thank you also to all those members who presented some very interesting pictures, especially to Christine Maughan who did a presentation on Garden Moths and treated us to some more of her excellent photographs.

A very big thank you also, to all those committee members who helped on the day, Gary did a wonderful job in the 'kitchen'. Melanie made £67 on the tombola and Max was brilliant on the projector. I cannot thank those members who helped on the day enough.

Although not present, we had some very good updates from County Recorders and it was a very enjoyable day.

Our thoughts were with Pat Orpe (Derbyshire Assistant Recorder) after her recent fall and Adrian Russell (Leicestershire Moth Recorder) with serious health problem. Also Mick Ball (Derbyshire Moth Recorder) after his recent stay in hospital.

Jane Broomhead

Field Trips are Back!

East Midlands Field Trips 2022

Chequered Skippers can be seen in England for the first time in 45 years

Thanks to the expertise of Butterfly Conservation and international conservation experts, changes in land management techniques from Forestry England, and hard-working volunteers from Butterfly Conservation, the butterfly can be seen in England for the first time since 1976 and is once again successfully breeding in a Northamptonshire forest.

The reintroduction of Chequered Skipper to England was part of the ambitious conservation project, Back from the Brink. Butterflies were collected in Belgium in 2018 and 2019 and released at the Northamptonshire site by experts from Butterfly Conservation, working in partnership with Forestry England who had carried out preparations to the site in order to help provide favourable habitats.

More Information

Identification Guides

Videos by Steve Mathers

The State of Britain's Larger Moths 2021

Learn more about the state of

Britain's macro moths

Dennis Dell on the spread of

His Imperial Majesty

Dennis Dell, our Purple Emperor champion (HIM), gives tips on how to find this iconic butterfly in an article originally written for the Yorkshire Branch.

Butterfly Conservation and Severn Trent announce a new 3-year conservation project in the Midlands

The project, titled Butterfly Mosaics, will form part of Severn Trent’s Great Big Nature Boost and aims to reverse the declines of specific species of butterfly and moth in the Midlands area. Read More...