Paul Leyland – Marbled White

Paul writes: For the past four months I’ve been looking at insects in and around my garden and reporting what I’ve found. I’ve decided I can now spread my wings a bit so I don’t miss out too much on what is happening elsewhere.

One of my favourite wildlife sights in Yorkshire, at this time of year, is seeing Marbled Whites (Melanargia galathea) resting on Greater Knapweed (Centaurea scabiosa). It doesn’t matter if the butterfly lands with wings closed or open, the colour combination of black, white and purple-pink is beautiful. With wings open you get a fantastic bright pattern of what seems to be random splashes of white on a black background. If they’re closed it’s a much more subtle pattern of geometric shapes, lines and circles. Fresh males are vivid black and white whilst the females have a paler brownish hue. The flower head is a mixture of large ragged petals on the outside surrounding smaller more densely packed florets in the centre. All of them are an amazing deep purple-pink colour. This is all then set against a background of soft green grasses.

The butterfly with its wings open I saw last weekend at Ellerburn Bank, which is a YWT Reserve of limestone grassland, near Pickering in North Yorkshire. The one with wings closed is from last year at Kiplingcotes Chalk Pit, another YWT Reserve, in East Yorkshire.

Marbled Whites are widespread throughout southern England but are found in distinct colonies. These get more scattered as you go north. Yorkshire, particularly the eastern part, is a good stronghold as one of  the butterfly’s favourite habitats is chalk grassland. There is plenty of this in the Wolds and surrounding areas, which is where I usually see them. They are a summer butterfly so it’s usually a nice warm sunny day when I see them, this can be from the middle of June until the end of July.

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