Joy from butterflies

Press, 2 December 1978, Page 15

Joy from butterflies

Beningh'eld's Butterflies. By Gordon Beningfield and Robert Goodden. Chatto and Windus. 82 pp. $20.45. (Reviewed by Nancy Cawley) Sensitive teamwork, and first-class printing and . presentation have produced a book that is a joy to handle. “Beningfield’s Butterflies” combines the considerable talents of the British wild-life artist, Gordon Beningfield, and the naturalist. and butterfly breeder, Robert Goodden. Beningfield has painted the 20 delicate water-colour studies of some of Britain’s butterflies preening on plants, trees and stones, each given impeccable full-page reproduction. His, too, are the gossipy asides that accompany each illustration, “The Orange Tip is one of my favourite butterflies. It reminds me of the early summer and. the English countryside . ..” and “on the day that I saw the Painted Lady settle on Ox-eye daisies, the weather was dull .. .” His painting technique is outlined in the artist’s introduction and here Beningfield admits that for exact measurement and colour pigmentation, he uses cabinet speciments of butterflies. (Not his, one is certain.) Working drawings are also included.

butterflies were mainly viewed as items to collect, and most books on them accepted this approach. With the world’s butterfly population declining each year, this is a very short-sighted policy. “Beningfield's Butterflies” should make the butterfly-chasers slow down for a quiet took. There are more than 70 different types of butterflies in Britain, and <n most groups numbers are declining. Climate and man share the guilt. A mild, damp winter, says Goodden, affects the hibernating stage of the butterfly favourites, among them a produced after a cold winter when hibernation is deeper and undisturbed. Man has reduced butterfly numbers with the use of agricultural insecticides, and insufficient flower and forest planting to compensate for urban sprawl. Robert Goodden recommends certain plants that are butterfly favourites, among them to plant that is popular with New Zealand gardens, the Buddleia or ‘‘butterfly bush,” that is so attractive to the Red Admiral. Even for armchair butterfly admirers those who cannot wander the woodlands and downs of Britain in search of the Purple Hairstreak or the Chalkhill blue, this book promises great satisfaction and many specimens can be found in our own gardens and countryside. Taken as a quality art book or a popular natural history publication it has much to offer.

Robert Goodden’s text gives details of each butterfly’s distribution, breeding, feeding and hibernation. He points out that until recently