Students in UHI North West and Hebrides’s Supported Learning class have received a letter from King Charles praising their work raising awareness of the rare small blue butterfly.
The small blue butterfly is the UK’s smallest butterfly. Since 1983, the national distribution of Small Blue has decreased by 43 per cent. In Scotland its abundance – the number of individuals counted at sites – has declined 39 per cent since 2005. It now has only 80 sites left in Scotland, with Caithness home to the three northernmost colonies of Small Blue in the country.
Working with conservation programme Species on the Edge, UHI’s Supported Learners have taken on the role of ambassador for the small blue for the past two years. They created keyrings, posters and information blocks which they sold to raise money for a ‘Butterfly Bank’ – an embankment of small blue habitat – in Dunnet Community Forest. They also created signage to help protect the Butterfly Bank and raise awareness among visitors to the forest. The Butterfly Bank has been a great success, with both small blues and small blue eggs spotted on it this year.
The students are continuing the ambassadorial work, spreading awareness of the small butterfly. Last term, they wrote letters to Jamie Stone MP, Maree Todd MSP, and to HRH King Charles. They were delighted to receive encouraging responses from all three – including a letter from the Head of Royal Correspondence on behalf of the King.
Louise Senior, People Engagement Officer for Species on the Edge, said: “We always look forward to our visits with our small blue ambassadors. They’re such an enthusiastic group who are keen to learn and eager to try out new activities.
We’ve been impressed with how seriously they have taken their role as ambassadors for the small blue butterfly. They have applied their talents in all sorts of ways to help increase the profile of this threatened creature, from fundraising to creative arts, and now letter writing.
I think our small blue ambassadors are proof that you don’t need to spend long days in the field carrying out surveys or habitat management to support our endangered wildlife, but that as long as you have a genuine interest there are all sorts of ways to help.”
Eleanor Pratt, Classroom Auxiliary for the Supported Learning group at UHI North, West and Hebrides, said: “The students (and staff!) always enjoy activity sessions with Species on the Edge. Although a lot of nature is not accessible for our students, Species on the Edge have overcome this by bringing nature to the students.
As Ambassadors for the small blue butterfly, the class have taken pride in hands-on projects, including sign making, spreading the word, and raising funds through crafts.
The latest class exercise was to write to prominent figures to highlight the plight of the small blue butterfly. The class received responses from Jamie Stone MP, Maree Todd MSP, and at the very end of term a letter from HRH Charles III. This brought much excitement and curiosity – a letter from the King!”
To learn how you can get involved in work to protect small blue butterflies in Caithness, please contact Louise Senior, People Engagement Officer for Species on the Edge: louise.senior@plantlife.org.uk
