So what will Butterfly World do for our butterflies?

Its an interesting question.

My personal opinion is that I think Clive Farrell and his team should be congratulated for getting butterflies in the media spotlight. The project at St Albans will be great for butterflies and for educating people about ourenvironment. It will also help raise much needed cash to help ourbutterflies through Butterfly Conservation.

However, until our government, the EU and the general public wake upto the sorry state we are in when it comes to wildlife in the UK,then we will never make any progress, no matter how much money is spent on or raised by such a wonderful project.

Farmers get a raw deal for the produce they grow and increased human population in the UK results in even less farmland (due to increased house bulding and associated roads and other infrastucture) and higher food prices... both of which combine to place huge presure onour wildlife.

Reports that the loss of EU set-aside funding will result in a population crash of Wild Hare (for example) will certainly also effect our butterflies. Uncontrolled cutting of hedgerows due to loss of farming subsidies means species like the Brown Hairstreak will suffer (as reported at Grafton Wood, in Worcestershire).

The lack of joined up thinking by apparently 'clever' people who run this country is not a result of a lack of inteligence, far from it,its a result of a culture dominated by big business, money and greed. So, although this is a great project which should be celebrated for its educational value, I wonder what could be done with £25 Million out in the wider countryside? I also wonder what the project impact will be in terms of traffic and polution in the St Albans area?

There are lots of positives and lots of negatives to this project. What we really need however is a government which rather than year on year cuts environmental budgets, it increases them. Until that happens I fear that we may see further species extinctions in the UK. A huge butterfly dome will not save wild butterflies (such as the High Brown Fritilary) if their habitats are destroyed through so called 'development' no matter how much money it raises for Butterfly Conservation.

Should we instead, encourage the general public to go out into the countryside and see and protect butterflies in the wild rather than create a culture where our children will only ever see animals in a zoo?

As A child, I remember seeing lots of butterflies in our garden. Today, the same garden is rarely visited by butterflies because the garden is now so much further away from the countryside. Children now growing up in the same street have never seen a butterfly in the 'wild' let alone collected caterpillars from a nettle patch down the road. Our countryside is being sanitised (field upon field of extensive farming practices, excessive road verge cutting, hedgerow cutting and gardens converted to block-paved eyesores) yet we don'tseem to care about the plastic bags tangled in trees and lining ourstreets. If we did, there would be more urgency to make the change.

I hope the St Albans project is a success. Its just a shame that we have to re-create habitats at a tourist attraction in order to educate people about the importance of butterflies and wildlife as a whole.