First Dorset butterfly of 2025

A red, black and browni butterfly with some white markings on some brown, rotting apples
Red Admiral. Photo: Stewart Balmain

We are delighted – if somewhat surprised, given the recent weather – to have had a Red Admiral reported, seen on 2 January 2025 in Broadstone. (Not the one in the photo above, which is from our archives). Red Admirals used to be migrants to this country, but these days some are staying over-winter. Their number go up and down:

2024 – 1,814 (first sighting 3 Jan)

2023 – 8598 (first sighting 2 Jan)

2022 – 1,462 (first sighting 1 Jan)

2021 – 2,978 (first sighting 20 Jan)

2020 – 2,358 (first sighting 2 Jan)

We do have to remember that sightings reported to the website reflect the diligence of our buttefly spotters in sending us their records, so comparisons are not exact.

You can find out more about Red Admirals in Dorset by going to our Red Admiral Species page, where you can see that their peak appearance over the last five years has been in July.

We are now in the first year of our next five-year recording cycle, so the map has been wiped clean and we need all your butterfly sightings to fill it.

 

 

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