Map of area covered for records
Butterfly Survey 1976-2025
Chalk Hill Blue
Chalk Hill Blue male/female
Habit: The unmistakable male chalk hill blue emerges in July - the much subtler and brownish female emerges slightly later. Both butterflies can be seen in substantial colonies on suitable chalk downland hillsides, where horseshoe vetch predominates. One such hillside is White Hill in Shoreham Kent, where in 1977, with permission from the Dunsany estate, I set up a private reserve. I practiced a new and non intensive, one man clearance regime and thanks to Mike Brown - North Kent BC. This method has more or less survived to this day. With the cooperation of the landowners of the adjacent Fackenden Bank, through to Otford, butterflies became and remain a priority - now representing, possibly the best and closest butterfly reserve to London.
History: The White Hill colony was part of a far more extensive network which covered a stretch on the Downs from Darent and Eynsford through to the Otford headland and East to Kemsing and Wrotham. Years of relative neglect to the hillsides and the Dunsany estate, left a progression of scrub developing into knots of small, bushy and then larger trees that shaded out and took over the once grazed grassland. Throughout, this has meant the former glory of these once grazed hillsides have changed dramatically, and despite the great storm of 1987 and then 1991
* 1 August BROMLEY 2011 historical records exist in both Plant and Chalmers Hunt, suggesting the migratory tendencies of this butterfly. Supports my 2011 possible sighting on Elmfield Bromley
Single brooded, eggs are laid exclusively on the horseshoe vetch, the larvae not emerging until spring. Ten weeks of growth precede pupation, which is (like the Large Blue, but without the ants) undertaken at the base of the foodplant and about a month later the butterflies emerge.
Larval Foodplant: horsesho vetch
wingspan: 28mm
Status: Not under threat on suitable chalk downland, but the studied colony varies from year to year.
WH - White Hill Shoreham, BC - Bromley Common, BIC-Bickley, Kes - Keston, Ha - Hayes --BN - Bromley North - Ey Eynsford - Orp-Orpington, FACK - Fackenden Down and Bank
Thanks to Howard Walmsley and David Davis, Fred O'Hare Steven Lofting and especially the late Mike Brown. Also FBook Butterflies of Kent United Kingdom
By Rodney Compton