FAMILY PARKLIFE: It was a year of winged wonders

Several species of exotic birds bred in the UK for the first time in decades, and rare migrant butterflies appeared across the east coast.

Wave after wave of scarce wildlife winged in from the continent. The arrival of these dazzling visitors sent wildlife obsessives sprawling over land and sea in pursuit.

The presence of these unexpected arrivals has been exciting, but it also suggests that a warming climate means the shape and make-up of British wildlife may never look quite the same again.

The excitement kicked off in May when hot spring temperatures heralded the arrival of a pair of bee-eaters on the Isle of Wight.

Looking like a fugitive from a tropical paradise, the bee-eater (pictured) is normally found in the Mediterranean.

Rainbow coloured plumage, a dramatically curved bill and long tail bestow star quality.

But what really got the crowds flocking to the National Trust’s Wydcombe Estate was when the birds bred and successfully raised chicks for only the third time in the UK in the last century.

National Trust wildlife expert Matthew Oates says there is a good chance these birds will return again in 2015.

“It was a good summer, with a lot of southerlies and also thunderstorms moving up from the south. Good summers almost invariably bring in the migrants,” he says.

“We discovered that there were actually two bee-eater nests. The two nests successfully raised eight young, which is utterly amazing by UK standards.

“Fingers crossed that some of these birds will return to breed next year, as they can be locality-faithful. Much depends on us getting a good summer next year.”

The undisputed supermodel of European birdwatching is the elegant black-winged stilt. A resident of southern Europe, a handful of stilts turn up in the UK every summer.

So when stilts appeared at the RSPB’s Frampton Marsh reserve in Lincolnshire there was a sense of mild excitement. This quickly turned to mild hysteria when the birds, just like the bee-eaters on the Isle of Wight, successfully bred and raised young – for the first time in 27 years.

This hysteria reached fever pitch when two rare glossy ibis, also from southern Europe, arrived on the reserve, set up a nest and showed signs of getting ready to breed. In the end, no chicks appeared – if they had it would have been a first for the UK.

The RSPB believes if the climate continues to warm there is every chance bee-eaters and stilts will colonise the UK.

Butterflies also got in on the act.

The name of the scarce tortoiseshell hints at how rarely this large and beautiful butterfly is encountered in the UK. In fact the only time this big brother of our native small tortoiseshell has been seen on our shores was one solitary sighting in 1953.

So when about 30 appeared across the east of England during two weeks in the summer, the butterfly spotting community was thrown into frenzy.

Wildlife charity Butterfly Conservation says the butterfly needs cold winters to hibernate successfully, but if a handful survive and emerge in 2015, it would be the first time the scarce tortoiseshell has done so in the 300-year history of UK butterfly monitoring.

On the south coast another exotic-looking butterfly took a significant step in its attempts to colonise. Offspring of continental swallowtail butterflies, which arrived in 2013 in the largest numbers since 1945, emerged this summer as adults along the south coast from Suffolk to Dorset.

If the species overwinters and emerges next spring it would suggest the continental swallowtail attempting to gain a foothold southern England.

If the climate continues to warm, the unprecedented events of this summer are set to become common, but not all new wildlife will be as welcome.

“Expect change, including radical change,” Oates says. “Expect new arrivals, which will be a mixture of nice and beautiful, benign and nasty species.”