The first sighting of a butterfly in spring lifts the soul. A sign of warmer and brighter days ahead, the butterfly is often seen as a symbol of hope, recovery, and new beginnings.
Simply being outdoors and connecting with nature has been found to be good for our physical, mental, and emotional health. Studies have shown that time spent in nature can also be an antidote for stress. It can lower blood pressure and stress hormone levels, as well as enhance immune system function, reduce anxiety, and improve our moods. Even simple activities involving nature, such as smelling a wildflower or caring for a houseplant, have been found to make us feel good.
Butterfly Conservation conserves and recovers butterflies and moths and champions them for the benefit of nature and people.
Saving Butterflies and Moths: our 2021-2026 strategy
Our new Plan to 2026 is designed to help deliver a step-change in nature conservation in the UK. To do that we need to build on our successes, focus our resources and deliver even greater impact. We must build stronger collaborations, be part of nature’s recovery at a larger scale, and broaden our reach so that everyone can enjoy the wonders of butterflies and moths. This Plan has been written to drive our work and activities. It will guide what we do over the next five years, how we raise and spend our funds, and how we talk about what we do. It will focus investment in our science and conservation work, and influence our partnerships and ways of working. At the heart of this Plan are three Strategic Goals. We are pledging to halve the number of threatened butterfly and moth species in the UK, double our impact on landscape restoration, and galvanise thousands of people to create new wild spaces for nature. These are ambitious targets – but the scale of the challenge demands ambition. We need to take urgent action, not just to prevent further species losses but to rebuild biodiversity. Butterflies and moths are not just an indicator of the state of the environment, but a demonstration of what nature recovery
can look like.
Our many successes in restoring habitats for individual species prove that, with the right approach, nature can and will bounce back. Climate change is already bringing new species to our shores, changing the distribution of butterflies and moths and altering the habitats they depend on. We need to ensure that nature based solutions to the climate crisis also provide maximum benefits for biodiversity. We will use our research and practice to deliver effective adaptation and mitigation techniques, improving our ability to prepare for change and making our environment more resilient. This Plan is not just about targets and tactics – it is also about the way we work as a charity. To make progress we need to be coordinated, systematic, risk-taking and efficient. We need to bring the same focus and rigour to our business operations as we do to our science and conservation work. Above all we need to work together, relentlessly, until we have better, smarter answers. We choose a positive future, where land use is more sustainable, where threatened species are recovering, where butterflies and moths thrive alongside people. This Plan provides a pathway to that future. Let’s work together to achieve it.
