Butterfly conservation
Understanding the evolutionary and ecological way that organisms respond to climate change is particularly important because it will allow key decisions to be made concerning the sustainable management of populations and habitats.
The Brown Argus butterfly Adaptation is likely to be particularly important for specialist, low dispersal species that otherwise will become trapped in increasingly marginal sites by gaps in the distribution of suitable habitat.
Of the four such butterfly species in the UK, two have recently expanded their ranges. One of these, the Brown Argus, was previously largely restricted to areas of common Rockrose habitat, but has shown a range expansion of more than 100 km in less than 30 years into a wider variety of habitats in eastern England.
This project will test for evolution at the species’ edge by comparing long-established and newly-founded populations, using field experiments to examine changes in host preferences, and to test for adaptation for increased dispersal in regions of recent colonisation.
In addition, a high density of genetic marker loci will be used to detect genetic changes associated with spread into marginal habitat. These data will identity genomic regions under selection at expanding ranges, and will examine changes in population structure that may be involved in rapid responses to climate change.