The Southern Blue Butterfly
A butterfly in miniature from Te Wai Pounamu
This week I'm celebrating the acceptance of one of my photographs in to the Dunedin Festival of Photography 2023. The festival is run by the Dunedin Photographic Society and is the first professional competition I’ve entered, so it feels like a rung up on the photography ladder.
The first time I saw a blue butterfly was the summer of 2021. I had made a little seating area with a bench surrounded by flowers grown from a packet of seed mix, and an ‘Instagram worthy’ display of scented Keith Hammett sweet peas.
It got morning sun and afternoon shade, so I could warm up before starting the day, and rest in the shade after a few hours of mahi (work). One weekend morning I was sitting there, staring at a thistle flower. I’d kept telling myself that I really must dig it out before it went to seed, but procrastination won and it was finally too late to do anything about it.
So there I was, looking at this floral reminder that I was behind (again) on the mahi, and a little blue landed on it, just for a moment. I’d never seen one in real life before - I had no idea they were so small! - and I added blues to the list of lepidoptera that I wanted to encourage into our garden.
I remember it clearly because, when I went to the dayjob on Monday, my colleague asked me what I did on the weekend - did I get up to anything exciting? Yes, I told her, I saw a blue butterfly in my garden!
She laughed and rolled her eyes at me, but that did nothing to dampen my enthusiasm. Except… we had plenty of clover in our garden already, so I wasn’t sure what else I could do to draw them in. We also had peas, beans, broom, and nectar sources so I eventually (and reluctantly) accepted that all I could do was practice patience.
And then this summer we had blues visit!💙 They seemed to love basking on our watering hose as it lay warming up on the lawn. There were just a couple at first, and I photographed them every chance I got (my parents will attest to my lying down on the grass to get up close).
Using iNaturalist and Moth & Butterflies NZ (MBNZ), I tried identifying the sub-species. My first assumption was common blue, but I was chuffed to find out they were in fact Zizina oxleyi, the only endemic blue butterfly of Aotearoa. They’re pretty much only found in our part of the country (south east South Island), but being a sub-species they do interbreed with the (native, but not endemic) Zizina labradus which has a greater habitat range.
For about a month after those first blues graced our garden, we got to see them almost every day. The mornings and late afternoons were my best chance at a sighting. I loved photographing them, challenging myself to get close-but-not-too-close and trying to be creative with composition while also trying not to scare them away.
I found that a higher aperture was needed to really get them in focus, so afternoons became my best bet at getting a photo with enough light to balance out the aperture. Other than that, it was about getting as low as possible and gradually shuffling in closer.
So what brought them in? As I’ve mentioned, we’ve had plenty of clover in our lawn from the start so it can’t just be about having host plants around. We’ve also got lots of butterfly-friendly flowers, evidenced by all the other butterfly species we’ve had visit.
Well, the summer of 2021-22 was the first time we trialled a meadow in the orchard (rather than an infrequent mowing regime). There’s plenty of clover in there, and I suspect that gave them a place to lay their eggs and a place where the larvae/pupae could overwinter without getting mown over. Just another reason for a meadow - even though it’s totally out of place as a ‘natural’ New Zealand habitat.
After watching Brian Cutting’s presentation through MBNZ earlier this year, I also discovered that many butterflies overwinter as larvae/pupae in undisturbed leaf litter. The key word here, of course, is ‘undisturbed’. Last autumn, I got a really bad case of Covid-19 and was also busy with exhibition preparations for my show with Artemis Jones. Long story short, I had no time (or energy) to rake up leaves - which I have done in previous years as they make a fantastic garden mulch.
If I’m right, the key to having blues in the garden this year was down to over-wintering. We finally gave them a fighting chance at surviving in their ‘youth’ through the cooler months, and they rewarded us with photo opportunities in summer!
So my challenge to you this week is to find a spot where you leave the leaves this autumn, or a patch of clover that you choose not to mow. I can’t promise you’ll get blues in your garden - but you definitely won’t if you don’t give them the chance.
Happy autumn,
Zenobia 🦋
Love butterflies? I have recently joined as a trustee of the Moths and Butterflies of NZ Trust (though I have been a member for a while). We’re raising money for research into our native copper butterflies which are, like many of our native insects, ridiculously under-researched. Even a small donation helps!
What a delight that little blue is!
The photo on the dry blade of grass is so lovely. The delicate shading of that little creature is enchanting. Thank you for sharing it.