Britain has
experienced a unique case in which a butterfly killer may face prison. In what
prosecutors are calling Britain's first conviction of its kind, Phillip Cullen,
57, was found guilty this week of capturing, killing and possessing specimens
of the country’s rarest butterfly: the Large Blue.
Cullen, who denied
the charges, could face a maximum of six months in prison when he is sentenced
next month, in April 2017. "It is an offence to capture, kill or possess
that butterfly because it is a protected species in the United Kingdom. It is a
unique case," prosecutor Kevin Withey told a magistrates court in Bristol,
in southwest England. "There has never been a prosecution in terms of
capturing and killing."
The Large Blue (Maculinea arion), first documented in
Britain in the 1790s, was declared extinct in 1979, but can now be found in 33
sites in southwest England thanks to David Simcox, an ecologist who drove his
van to Sweden in 1983, collected some eggs and reintroduced them into the
United Kingdom.
During the trial, the
court heard how Cullen was seen in June 2015 running after the butterflies with
a small net at a nature reserve in Gloucestershire, while a friend stood watch
nearby. He was also observed acting suspiciously at another Large Blue
butterfly hot spot in Somerset. A butterfly expert at the Gloucestershire
nature reserve witnessed Cullen in the act and photographed him. When he
confronted Cullen and asked him what he was doing, Cullen said he was looking
for parasitic wasps.
After suspicions were
raised, police last year raided Cullen’s home near Bristol, where they
discovered hundreds of dead butterflies encased in glass. Significantly, two
dead Large Blue butterflies were labelled with the letters CH and DB, which
prosecutors said stood for Collard Hill in Somerset and Daneway Banks in
Gloucestershire, where the butterfly abductions or killings had taken place,
although it was not clear exactly where the butterflies were killed.
Cullen said CH was
short for "Cobalt Hue" and that DB stood for "Dark Blue."
He acknowledged that he had traded in butterflies in the past, but that he
bought them legally and sold them at auction.
Asked by his defence
lawyer if he had, at any time, chased a blue butterfly, he replied, "Not
at any time."
"Did you capture
one?" his lawyer asked. "No, I did not," Cullen replied.
Collecting butterflies
and moths has been practiced in Britain for centuries, and was considered a
gentlemanly hobby in Victorian times, when collectors would display their
catches in glass display cases. Two British prime ministers, Neville
Chamberlain and Winston Churchill, were among those who enjoyed the hobby. A
mounted Large Blue butterfly can fetch as much as $US400.
The practice of
butterfly collecting has fallen out of favour in this conservationist age, and
of the 59 species of butterflies in the United Kingdom, six, including the
Large Blue, are fully protected, and it is illegal to collect, sell or kill
them. The Large Blue is endangered globally.
Photograph:
butterfly-conservation.org
MARTINA NICOLLS is an international
aid and development consultant, and the author of:- The Shortness of
Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet
(2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).
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