This small blue butterfly with ‘tails’ to its hindwings is rarely seen in the UK, but there have been a number of UK sightings this year, including ten in Dorset. We have now had news of the butterfly having bred in a garden Continue reading
Long-tailed Blue. Photo: Simon Crampin
Long-tailed Blue. Photo: Simon Crampin
Simon found this Long-tailed Blue at Durlston Head on 22/08/2019 and the second photo clearly shows the tails. This is a butterfly not often seen in this country but we have had 5 records sent to the website this year. They have also been reported in other areas along the south coast, notably in Sussex.
The eggs are laid on Broad-leaved Everlasting-pea, Broom, and possibly a range of other legumes.
Long-tailed Blue. Photo: Guy Freeman.
Long-tailed Blue. Photo: Guy Freeman
Another Long-tailed Blue! Seen by Guy in Wareham Forest on 26/08/2019. The lower shot shows the butterfly appearing to lay on some Dwarf Gorse, but Guy found no eggs.
These butterflies are not usually seen in the UK, but do occasionally turn up due to their caterpillars coming in on vegetables then hatching. This year, however, reports are coming in from a lot of places in the south of the country, so most of them will be true migrants. Butterfly Conservation HQ have put out an interesting press release about it. Dorset currently boasts four sightings.
We know our Alners Gorse Butterfly Reserve is pretty special, but we didn’t expect this! Continue reading
Adrian Flynn has reported a Long-tailed Blue to us, complete with photos. This is only the 10th Dorset record since 2010. Continue reading
Long-tailed Blue (Upperside). Photo: Steve Maskell
Long-tailed Blue (Underside). Photo: Steve Maskell
A brilliant find by Steve Maskell of a male Long-tailed Blue butterfly at Kingston Lacy back on 20/09/2015. Although no sightings of this rare migrant butterfly have been reported in Dorset since, there is a possibility of doing so now with individuals still appearing this November.
The caterpillars of this species feed primarily on Broad-leaved Everlasting-pea (Lathyrus latifolius) so plant some in your garden and you could be in for a real treat next autumn!
Long-tailed Blue. Photo: Patrick Jefferies
Another shot of the beautifully patterned Long-tailed Blue butterfly, photographed at RSPB Lodmoor Nature Reserve in Weymouth on 29/08/2015.
Long-tailed Blue. Photo: Patrick Jefferies
Long-tailed Blue (Underside). Photo: Patrick Jefferies
An extremely lucky find by Patrick Jefferies; a Long-tailed Blue butterfly spotted at RSPB Lodmoor Nature Reserve, Weymouth on 29/08/2015.
Long-tailed Blue. Photo: Cath Walker
Cath Walker writes (on her Flickr Page – reproduced with permission):
The Curious Incident of the Unfamiliar Butterfly In the Kitchen
This morning I was slaving over a hot tax return form when Liz called me from the kitchen: “Do you want to see a butterfly?” Any sentence with “butterfly” in it gets me running, and so I ran to the kitchen to find this butterfly on a window pane. It looked like nothing I had ever seen before. Oh, the excitement!! I rushed (lots of fast exercise here) to get the camera and a glass jam jar to put the butterfly in so I could take its portrait before releasing it into the wild. Once released into the wild, ie the garden, it flew quickly away, so I only have indoor pictures to show.
Cath contacted our Records Officer, Bill Shreeves, who replied:
You are completely correct in your identification as a male Long -Tailed Blue & in your comment on Flickr that it is very rare. With global warming we are hopeful that in time it might become a regular inhabitant – it does after all occur commonly all over southern Europe & Asia, Africa & even Australia.
Our problem is that none of its stages seem to be able to get through the British winter. One of the first ever recorded in Britain was back in 1859 in Christchurch. After that it was seen fairly regularly but only in big numbers in 1945 & 1990.
It is a very bold migrant & in Asia steadily climbs the foothills of the Himalayas reaching Nepal at as high as 3,650 metres & reverse migrating to the lowlands!
In Dorset at least one has been reported yearly since 2005 except for 2006 & 2008. Yours is the only one so far for 2013.
Many of the records are in September but in 2007 there was one around the same time as yours – 14th October in that case – also found indoors. This makes me wonder whether the caterpillar or chrysalis might somehow have been brought inside.
The caterpillar feeds inside the pods of leguminous plants like everlasting peas, lentils & Bladder-senna. A famous example was in 1999 when butterflies found indoors were shown to have emerged from batches of mange-tout peas brought all the way from Kenya!
Not long ago I was invited to verify a Long Tailed Blue which suddenly appeared in a pantry. The householders had bought legumes some while back in an outdoor market and we hypothesised that they had contained a caterpillar or chrysalis.
If you can remember anything similar which might account for how yours came to be on a window pane in your kitchen please let me know!
Cath responded:
It seems most likely that the long-tailed blue must have entered our kitchen as a caterpillar or chrysalis in something, although I can’t think what, as most of the vegetables we buy are in shrink-wrapped supermarket packets and kept in the fridge. Home-grown vegetables enter the house accompanied by various insects – but then how would the caterpillar have got into them in the first place, if it’s a migrant from warmer climes? In the hot weather we have the kitchen door open all day, but even at the butterfly peak, only about one managed to fly into the kitchen. So in all, it’s a bit of a mystery how the long-tailed blue got here!