The Friends of Middleton Park are hosting a free guided walk in Middleton Park on Sunday (26 July 2026) exploring trees and butterflies within the park.
As part of city wide butterfly conservation work, this year work has started on a wild flower meadow on the ‘Old Nine’ area of the park. The work was done in partnership with Butterfly Conservation and I hope we will see good numbers of butterflies.
The Old Nine used to be part of the municipal golf course at Middleton has in the last few years been planted with specimen natural and parkland trees, by Wade’s Charity, to make an interesting Tree Trail. Of course the park has a wonderful selection of existing trees, which we will do our best to try and identify as we pass, so if you wish, you can brush up on your tree identification skills.
Part of Middleton Park is a Local Nature Reserve, and at this time of year there are many butterflies and other insects around. We will see how many different sorts of butterfly we can find. While the park cannot boast any rare species, it does have a good population of Purple Hairstreak butterflies. The Purple Hairstreak can be hard to spot, as it lives high
up in oak trees, and is often overlooked. Let hope for some sun to bring them out in good numbers!
The walk starts at 1:30pm, prompt, this Sunday at the Visitor Centre in the park, and will last approximately 1½ hours. Walks in the park may often include muddy or wet wooodland paths, so please wear boots or walking shoes, and appropriate clothing.
We will have ID sheets for common butterflies and trees to hand out to aid identification.
The Visitor Centre is accessed off Town Street, LS10 3SH.
This post was written by Jim Jackson
Photo: A male Purple hairstreak butterfly (Neozephyrus quercus)
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