Butterflies and Moths
Moths and butterflies and their associated caterpillars are found mostly in the warmer months of the year around the majority of the world. Within the UK both butterflies and moths are a very important but threatened part of the UKs' wildlife. They have been found to be indicators to the health of the environment as well as often playing vital roles in the ecosystem including being a crucial part of the food chain to many predatory insectivores as well as being essential in pollinating a variety of plants.
Images on this page
In the UK there are 59 different species of butterfly and over 2500 different species of moth, all of which spend time in caterpillar form. Unfortunately I haven't yet managed to capture photos of the majority of these species so this gallery only contains a collection of images that I have been lucky enough to capture of butterflies, moths and their caterpillars. It includes images of the common butterflies peacocks and tortoiseshells, the colourful blues and coppers as well as the drabber speckled woods. The moths include both day and night flying moths showing the range of colours from the brown beauties to the vivid elephant hawk moths
Almost all the images are of wild, un-fridged animals as they spend time in their natural habitats in the vegetation. However some of the moth images have been taken of moths after they have been caught in moth trapping monitoring events
More information
The majority of the images here have been identified to species if you click on them and check the descriptions. If you want to learn more about any of these then the Butterfly Conservation Society is a valuable resource of information and for conservation of these amazing and beautiful species