An attractive western pine elfin butterfly was seen on April 7th, actively flying in the DCA Butterfly Reserve during this interesting April heat-wave. These small butterflies do seem to “magically appear”, true to their elfin name, dancing around trees and shrubs. Pine trees are important in the habitat as the little green stripy elfin caterpillars feed on pine needles. Their parent butterflies are seen all over northern Denman. The coastal subspecies of the western pine elfin is a rare blue-listed butterfly in BC – another Denman treasure.
The DCA’s Settlement Lands Butterfly Reserve is a work in progress. Once the breeding area and site of the first identification (2005) of the endangered Taylor’s checkerspot butterfly on Denman, the Settlement Lands slowly has been regenerating as forest. On the upper bench of the Settlement Lands there are interesting sedge wetlands in which the checkerspot caterpillars’ food plants thrived. This bench-land is largely sandstone with little soil and trees here grow slowly. For these reasons and in general to try to enhance the survival of butterfly species, a small area of the Settlement Lands’ bench-area was chosen as a site to manage for butterfly habitat. The management of the small reserve, assisted in the past two years by funding from the Federal government Habitat Stewardship Program, means keeping the majority of trees at bay and allowing the native meadow species to flourish. The remaining trees create an open meadow/woodland-type atmosphere. The trees and shrubs give some shelter and protection to meadow species while not overly restricting their sunshine-seeking habits. Researchers will be monitoring butterflies and flowering plants within the meadow/woodland butterfly reserve this summer.
