VIDEO: £28,000 project hopes to help rare butterfly

ONE of Britain's rarest butterflies has been handed a lifeline by the Steyning Downland Scheme.
Co-ordinator Sarah Quantrill (left) launches the butterfly project S44505H14Co-ordinator Sarah Quantrill (left) launches the butterfly project S44505H14
Co-ordinator Sarah Quantrill (left) launches the butterfly project S44505H14

Numbers have crashed since the 1970s and only about 100 colonies of Duke of Burgundy butterflies remain. Two of these are in Sussex but in 2003, only eight of the species were seen in the whole county.

The Heritage Lottery Fund has granted £28,000 for the Steyning Dukes and Downland Project in a bid to encourage the dainty little butterfly back to the chalk grasslands of the Steyning downland.

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The project is being run in conjunction with the South Downs National Park Authority and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Co-ordinator Sarah Quantrill (left) launches the butterfly project S44505H14Co-ordinator Sarah Quantrill (left) launches the butterfly project S44505H14
Co-ordinator Sarah Quantrill (left) launches the butterfly project S44505H14

Matthew Thomas, Steyning Downland Scheme project manager, said: “These butterflies would have been here hundreds of years ago but the numbers have crashed. They haven’t been here since around the Second World War.”

It is hoped people living in the area will get involved and a free launch event to explain the project is being held at the Steyning Centre on Monday, December 8, at 7pm.

Sarah Quantrill, project co-ordinator, explained: “The emphasis is on involving the local community, with volunteers carrying out conservation work, which we already do but will be doing more of. “We are asking people to join up as butterfly monitors from May to August next year.”

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The project includes the northern margin of the scheme, the south-west corner of Steyning Coombe and an area known as The Secret Garden. Sarah said the area was chalk grassland which had grown over with trees and scrub.

“It has not been grazed, so we are starting a grazing programme using Frances Sedgwick’s Dexter cattle and cows from Brinsbury College,” said Sarah.

“Grazing is really key because if we just cut it down, it will grow back.

“Primulas are the food plant for caterpillars so we plan to plant cowslip plugs as well as harvesting seeds. Local people will be growing the plants as well. It is a various pronged attack.”

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Butterfly expert Neil Hulme will be working with the two-year project, having already been successful in seeing the Duke of Burgundy species return to Chantry Hill, about 15km west of the Steyning Downland Scheme.

Sarah said: “They won’t come for a while. It is not a quick fix. It is about creating the right habitat and hoping it comes naturally to the site.

“Anything you can do naturally is always better and if they come, we know we have got it right because they have chosen it themselves.”

Tom Parry, South Downs National Park ranger, said: “Chalk grassland is one of the most endangered habitats in the country and vital to the survival of rare wildlife such as the Duke of Burgundy.

“It’s exciting to be working with the Steyning Downland Scheme to increase the range of this important but threatened butterfly.”

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