This page contains insights or other information since the book’s publication, following the taxonomic sequence used in the book that is taken from Checklist of the Lepidoptera of the British Isles (Agassiz, Beavan & Heckford, 2013).
Apollo
The Apollo has not been seen north of the Dovre mountains in Norway. My thanks to Kaare Aagaard for pointing this out. The distribution data used for the map was taken from GBIF, and this data has since been ‘cleansed’!
Black-veined White
The Black-veined White has not been seen north of the Dovre mountains in Norway. My thanks to Kaare Aagaard for pointing this out. The distribution data used for the map was taken from GBIF, and this data has since been ‘cleansed’!
Southern Small White
The ‘event of the year’ in 2025 will be the ‘not unexpected’ arrival of the Southern Small White Pieris mannii to our shores. Its vernacular name pays homage to its original distribution as a butterfly found only in southern Europe. However, over recent decades, the butterfly has been moving northward apace and has, after at least five years of anticipation, finally reached us. The first confirmed sighting, on 3rd August at Landguard Bird Observatory, was made by William Brame as reported here. Both Chris van Swaay and Guy Padfield consider this to be, without doubt, a female mannii. A summary of 2025 sightings can be found here.
Monarch
The text on Page 105: “Were I to live near the coast in south-east England or south-east Ireland, then my garden would be full of milkweeds and probably not much else” should read “Were I to live near the coast in south-west England or south-west Ireland, then my garden would be full of milkweeds and probably not much else”.
Queen of Spain Fritillary
Page 141 refers to “Assignation Thickets”. This should read “Assington Thickets” (now known as Assington Thicks).
American Painted Lady
2023 proved to be quite a year for this species with the first ever records of home-grown adults. All sightings are from St Mary’s, Isles of Scilly, starting on 14th October 2023. On October 26th, five individual butterflies were seen flying in a field north of Sandy Lane, where lots of Jersey Cudweed, a larval food plant, was present. A total of nine unique individuals was determined by Bob Dawson, a resident on the Isles of Scilly. The assumption is that the butterflies were the offspring of a gravid female that had arrived earlier in the year, probably around mid-August. The sightings coincided with the arrival of several North American bird species and even sightings of the Green Darner dragonfly, another North American species.
At least one other specimen was seen on both 17th (by Ian Anstey) and 18th August 2024 (by David Moore) on the Pembrokeshire coast, with another seen on St Agnes, Isles of Scilly on 24th August (as reported by Bob Dawson).
Another specimen was seen on 24th August 2025 by Steve Nash on his garden Buddleja at St. Mellion, Cornwall, as reported on the Migrant Lepidoptera (GB & Ireland) Facebook page.
Another was found at Lodmoor RSPB reserve, Weymouth, Dorset on 22nd September 2025 by Sam Ellis, a sighting seconded by Phil Sterling.
Scarce Tortoiseshell
Page 202 states: “The first report came from Peter Willmott, who photographed a Scarce Tortoiseshell at Salcey Forest, Northamptonshire, on 9th March 2014“. Unfortunately, this sighting is missing from the 2014 list of sightings and map on Page 204.
Lang’s Short-tailed Blue
Another specimen was reported by Mike Ducks on 24th August 2023 “on private land, near the top of a Pembrokeshire hill” in South Wales, as reported on birdforum. The finder subsequently stated “At the same time as a Western Bonellis Warbler appeared on Skokholm and a Melodious Warbler on Bardsey, both with significant Spanish populations“.
Yet another specimen of this extremely rare species was found by Mark Tunmore in his moth trap in Cornwall on 8th September 2025.