Map of area covered for records
Butterfly Survey 1976-2020
Marbled White
wingspan: 43 mm - sexes similar
Habit: Inhabits open grassland and chalk downs. Weak flight, resting frequently. Colonial, often seen numerously, in loosely linked groups lazily feeding or resting among the long summer grasses on which it lays its eggs.
Single brooded - can be seen on the wing from early to mid Summer onwards
Larval Foodplant: grasses, eggs laid singly at random
Status: From the mid 1980's this butterfly became common locally on Lullingstone Golf Course and other downland areas nearby. Later, presumably part of a general expansion from Surrey it occured at High Elms. Extraordinarily though I found one present in the set-aside adjacent to Oakley Road, then a small colony on the fields edge near the Hayes Rugby club pitch. It is now spreading dramatically North into South East London, so can be seen almost anywhere on suitable areas. Similar redistributive occurences were also recorded during the early twentieth century by Chalmers Hunt in Butterflies of Kent.
WH - White Hill Shoreham, BC - Bromley Common, Ha Hayes --BN Bromley North - Ey Eynsford - Lull - Lullingstone Golf Course Orp- Orpington BN-Bromley North etc
© Rodney Compton