Natural Selection

I’ve had a long-standing wish to see a Small Blue butterfly. I achieved that ambition today and I’m pleased. So now we know there’s a happy ending let’s rewind a bit.

Names given to animal species can sometimes be left field, but this is the smallest blue butterfly in Britain. It’s scarce and declining, and for many years the nearest population to anywhere I’ve lived was the Workington area. It never quite felt justifiable to drive to north west Cumbria to see a butterfly, so I never did. Then a colony was discovered on the slag bank in Barrow.

Looking south from the slagbank towards Barrow

I don’t think it’s completely known how these butterflies appeared in Barrow, but an unauthorised introduction may have been the cause. These are not unknown with butterfly species. If they were deliberately released it was a sound choice of location as there is plenty of kidney vetch, which the larvae need to live on.

The last couple of years I’ve hoped to combine a trip to watch Barrow AFC with a Small Blue hunt. It just never worked out, the only days I was in the area in the flight season the weather was completely unsuitable. The season’s over for another year but I was in town to do some bird surveys, and the weather was set fair so I parked up inland of the slag banks and walked under the rail bridge to the right area.

Just beyond the tunnel I saw two small looking blue butterflies just on grass. I assumed I was mistaken about their size and they would turn out to be Common Blues, but in fact the first two butterflies I saw proved to be what I had come for.

A wander to what should have been the search point did produce a few more sightings and also a Dingy Skipper, another scarce butterfly that occurs in some ‘brownfield’ locations. The picture off my phone isn’t great.

There were a couple of couples also looking for the Small Blues, which have obviously become something of a low key environmental tourist attraction. If you are in Barrow on a sunny May day this year or in the future why not get yourself down there and have a look. Even if your luck isn’t in regarding butterfly sightings the views of the Duddon Estuary and Black Combe are rather good.

From the bottom – Walney Channel, North Walney Nature Reserve mid frame, the Duddon Estuary beyond then Black Combe