This is the largest scientific escapade of its kind, a nationwide twitch of lepidopteral attention, and one in which you, yes, you, perched on your deckchair with a cup of afternoon tea, can play a part.
Not to save the world, but perhaps to keep it a touch more fluttery.
Our butterflies, those airborne scraps of stained glass, are vanishing, fading like old frescoes in the British drizzle.
Conservationists, bless their earnest socks, are trying to work out why.
Weather, climate, concrete. Take your pick. But to act, they need to know. And to know, they need you.
All that’s asked of you is a quarter of an hour. Fifteen minutes of your life beneath a reasonably cooperative sky, noting which winged sylphs flit past.
There’s a butterfly ID chart online, an identification aide for the unsure, the city-raised, or the spectacularly inattentive.
Yes, moths too, if they’re foolish enough to be out in daylight.
Go to www.butterflycount.org. The great fluttering census began on the 18th of July and draws in its net on Sunday the 10th of August.
So go on. Count something that isn’t on a screen.
Graeme Dinnen
ResourcesForLife.net
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