Saturday, 7 June 2014

Big Year for Burnet Companions

One of the things I find interesting is to see what the big wildlife winners are in any year. This is based I guess on the interactions of weather, management systems and the species' particular strategies, and unravelling those complex interactions is beyond me. I can though report on those species that do exceptionally well here in any season. A very noticeable winner this year is the Burnet Companion moth (Euclidia glyphica). Most days I see dozens of them even when conditions are overcast rather than sunny. The population here is much bigger than in previous years. My moth book says that larval foodplants include "......Common Bird's Foot Trefoil......and probably other trefoils and vetches". That could be a partial explantion of the quantities on site this year. Lst year was a very big year for Greater Bird's Foot Trefoil and with the already large population of Common Bird's Foot Trefoil there was a vast amount of trefoil last year for the larvae.

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