Fri July 29th Going... Going... Gone...

I struggled to see a lone Purple Emperor at Knepp today, an OAP male -

The butterfly is effectively OVER, at Knepp and nationally. It has flown there for a record 44 days, and I saw it on 41.

At Knepp, it's had its second best year since effective monitoring began in 2014, but way behind the annus mirabilis that was 2018.  

Keep checking this Blog, which functions all year round to bring you news about Purple Doings. 

For example, we've found that the empty pupal cases flouresce under UV torchlight at night, and that these cases last for some time in the wild. As the evenings draw in I will be going out with my UV torch looking for pupal cases, as a survey technique, and perhaps to get some angle on population size.... Exciting times!