Thursday 12 June 2014

Butterfly news

and excellent news it is - the Continental Swallowtail is breeding in Sussex! I pass on this report partly for its happy content, and partly for the glorious sentence 'The UK's subspecies is smaller, darker and lives in Norfolk'.

3 comments:

  1. Smaller, darker, lives in Norfolk, and extremely fussy about its food. And, we might suppose, simultaneously fascinated and repulsed by the flamboyance and promiscuous eating habits of its Continental cousin.

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  2. This is also rather wonderful: "Gritting the roads with salt increases wing power in butterflies and boosts their brain size, according to a study released earlier this week.
    Research by Minnesota University found male insects that fed on plants rich in sodium that had run off from nearby roads had bigger muscles - while the females had larger eyes."

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  3. Absolutely, Waldo - give me the dark and dwarfish Norfolk-dweller every time!
    And yes, Anon, that's an interesting bit of research - butterflies love their minerals, and I'm sure there's a lot more to be found out about their tastes and needs. The things Purple Emperors enjoy feeding on are utterly disgusting...

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