So you think you know your butterflies?
Are you going to accept the challenge we are offering to put your butterfly identification skills to the test?
As I explained previously in January we are determined to start monitoring the biodiversity of the area of Curry Woods and its surroundings. This was the theme of the Annual General Meeting and the talk by Fred Giles of The Recorders of the Avalon Marshes.Therefore we are planning to establish a baseline for biodiversity in the area around the Trust land, starting with regular butterfly monitoring.
The aim is to monitor butterfly types and numbers along a specified corridor once a week from April to September. One corridor or transect has been identified, taking in the Trust field and then following a footpath from the Trust entrance to the top of Red Hill, then another footpath past Heale House and finishing at Water Street. Two further transects are planned on the south side of the A378.So we need more volunteers.On the 18th the first group of 5 volunteers will walk the first route and start to put together a rota for when they can do the counting.
Fred Giles or a colleague will give a training session for all volunteers before April. The data gathered will be entered on the national database and as a community ( people will inevitably come and go!) we will be expected to commit to at least 10 years of data gathering.This is an interesting and useful way, using the Field Studies Council guide to butterflies(supplied by us) to get to know other people interested in local biodiversity, get fitter and follow the changes in insect numbers during the evolution of the Trust Land. Please call on 07903030533 or contact SMGoodenough@aol.com to volunteer.
So a quick question along the lines of what came first, flowering plants or butterflies? In this case its a fairly simple answer-flowering plants. How do we know this? As it turns out one example, Magnolia spp, are as good as H.G. Wells’ time machine. This is because if you look closely at the fully open flowers of Magnolia there are never clouds of butterflies or bees around and in them. A huge Magnolia with many flowers should be covered in insects making a busy buzzing. But if you look closely you will see lots of beetles in the flowers and they are the pollinaters. How come? Well, Magnolia was the first plant to evolve multicoloured flowers; before that the absence of flowers meant the absence of nectar which is the only food food for bees or butterflies. However there were beetles that eat other things and they became the pollinators. Subsequently the sweet sugary patches on the base of flower petals (nectaries) became larger and some insects evolved to eat this food exclusively and also carried pollen between flowers. There followed an evolutionary explosion as flowering plants increased in number and type exponentially So moths, butterflies and bees also evolved exponentially.However this came to an end when the clash between human development and the existing finely balanced ecosystems finally came to a head. It has become obvious that biodiversity, after millions of years of evolution, cannot any longer evolve fast enough to keep up with the changes and there is the potential for even more disaster for the environment than we have inflicted so far.
We are already having to change most of our traditional ways to prevent total environmental collapse so more effort must also be made to make room to conserve biodiversity.
On a more positive note the Trust has received funding from Somerset Rivers Authority to replant Yeomans Copse with over 300 shrubs and trees to replace the ash killed by disease. Planting will begin on the 28th February and again volunteers are doing this. Although it will have been done by the time you read this we will be crowd funding to raise £250, which will be doubled by Aviva, to do work on the hedges between Yeomans Copse and the main land.
Details of how to donate are on the front page of this website.
