Sheepdrove Rare Butterfly Project

 

Sheepdrove Organic Farm has an ambitious conservation project to help save rare butterflies, launched April 2009 with the generous help of volunteers and our partner organisations.

Our top priority butterfly is Marsh Fritillary. Two target areas on the farm, one each in Berkshire and Oxfordshire, will be grazed with cattle to produce exactly the right sort of habitat characteristics to suit it. Other species we hope to attract include the Small Blue and the Chalkhill Blue. The first phase of the project aims to create new potential breeding sites with masses of caterpillar food plants.

Natural England supports the scheme with Environmental Stewardship funds, because the Marsh Fritillary and Small Blue are both high priorities for the UK Biodiverity Action Plan, and the project fits the aims of their North Wessex Downs Target Area. > What are your local targets? 

Marsh Fritillary

The adult is in flight from May to July, and feeds by drinking nectar from flowers. However, the tribes of caterpillars - which live in silken tents - usually only eat Devilsbit Scabious.

Marsh Fritillary populations have plummeted nationwide, as suitable habitat disappeared as a result of industrialised agriculture. Around the Lambourn Downs, the type of habitat that Marsh Fritillary needs is now scarce and only available in small, isolated patches. The butterfly has only 1 known breeding colony left in Berkshire, but Sheepdrove is just 2 km away, and within flying range.

Conservation grazing

Making the place just right requires the services of our award-winning beef cattle! They tackle the toughest grasses and leave a patchy mixture of short and tall turf, which is good for sunbathing caterpillars. Our farming staff will watch the progress of the grazing to make sure the sward is never overdone. We will not let sheep into the special project areas, because they graze too uniformly, and eat our best caterpillar plants. Numbers of livestock will be kept low, to allow the wildflowers to flourish, set seed and multiply.

We have already begun to see real changes in the target areas being grazed, and it is very encouraging to see the Devilsbit Scabious in flower.

 

The caterpillar food

Charles Flower Wildflowers grew our hundreds of pots of Devilsbit Scabious. Charles Flower is a well known consultant, and author of the stunning book, 'Where Have All the Flowers Gone?'

All the seeds were locally sourced, many from Cockcrow Bottom at Sheepdrove which was, fortunately, too steep to ever be ploughed and that is why it still holds a remnant pocket of ancient grassland, thousands of years old.

Sheepdrove Rare Butterfly Project has also established Kidney Vetch for Small Blue and Horseshoe Vetch for Chalkhill Blue.

 

Project partners

Leanne Smith of Natural England (far right) with project partners

Local naturalists George and Val Osmond inspired us with their devoted work to record and conserve rare butterflies in the local area over several decades. To develop this project Sheepdrove Organic Farm brought together a range of organisations and experts. Jason Ball, our manager for biodiversity and alternative energy, worked in consultation with:

• Natural England
• Butterfly Conservation
• Butterfly Conservation Upper Thames Branch
• Flora Locale
• Berks, Bucks and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust
• Pang Kennet Lambourn Valleys Countryside Project
• FWAG (Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group)
• Forestry Commission
• Thames Valley Environment Records Centre

North Wessex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty helped germinate the farm's ideas by awarding funds for an educational partnership project with Trinity School in 2007.

The collective knowledge of the different conservation organisations was invaluable. Butterfly Conservation visited the farm to help us understand the needs of the butterflies. The Forestry Commission agreed to let us have cattle in a tree plantation so that we did not lose an excellent, young woodland edge which provides shelter and nectar sources for many types of butterfly. Flora Locale provided excellent advice about where to source plants and seeds locally, and also about ground preparation methods.

 

Join our challenge!

Cowslips on Bockhampton Down grow in waves half a mile long!

We welcome volunteers who wish to help us to develop the project, and monitor the sites as they mature. Please contact us if you would like to be part of the team, doing tasks like these:

• create and plant new areas 
• collect and grow seeds
• plant and protect trees
• maintain gates and fences
• photography
• butterfly surveys
• plant surveys
• searches for host plants with caterpillars

 

Scientific research projects can also play an important role, e.g. understanding and recording the process of habitat change; or butterfly surveys; or genetic and behavioural studies of butterfly populations. Matt Dowse (Southampton University) wrote a research dissertation which investigated the conservation challenge for Marsh Fritillary in the local countryside.

We are very grateful to everyone who takes part in the project.