Species of the Month: Purple Hairstreak Favonius quercus (November 2024)

You may be surprised to see a butterfly for the species of the month in November. Until fairly recently this was one of our most difficult butterflies to record due to it spending most of its time at the top of oak trees, well out of sight of the average wildlife enthusiast. Volunteer butterfly recorders in the East of Scotland have recently had success finding new colonies by looking for the eggs of Purple Hairstreak on wind-blown oak twigs. The species overwinters as an egg; these are small, white and spiky, somewhat resembling a tiny, white sea urchin, and are laid next to, or amongst, the terminal buds at the top of oak trees. It would be well worth checking blown down oak branches and twigs for theses eggs, especially after a storm.

The current known distributions of Purple Hairstreak in our area is patchy, particularly in Ayrshire where there are very few recent records. But they could potentially be found almost anywhere in our region! The SWSEIC team had a quick excursion to Colliston Park in Dalbeattie this month following Storm Ashley and manged to find an egg from the sole native oak tree there, so the habitat doesn’t have to be extensive. Although areas of mature sessile or pedunculate oak are likely to yield the best results.

Malcolm Haddow

SWSEIC Support Officer