Written by: Craig Boath
2021
Carnoustie Golf Links is teaming up with Carlogie Primary School, Tayside Biodiversity Partnership, Food is Free and Butterfly Conservation to stop the extinction of Small Blue Butterflies. Over 500 kidney vetch plants were planted along the Buddon Links coastline to help create a food corridor.
Small Blue is the UK’s smallest butterfly and is easily overlooked due to its size, dusky coloration and because it is confined to small patches of grassland where kidney vetch, its sole larval foodplant, grows. In Scotland, it is primarily a coastal species with isolated colonies along the east coast from Caithness in the far north, around the Moray Firth, Angus, and Berwickshire in the south. Small Blue is single brooded in Scotland with adults usually flying from late May to early July.
