Identify caterpillars by their food plant
This page is dedicated to helping identify caterpillars by their food plant.
If you find a caterpillar eating a plant it'll help you identify it and you may consider growing these plants to help nature in your garden. This information came from a 1987 Readers Digest Nature Notes Book - wonderfully illustrated by Peter Barrett. (The UK Butterfly Conservation website is also an excellent source of information)
small and essex skipper - eat grass
large skipper - cocks foot grass, false broome grass
lulworth skipper - chalk false brome grass, couch grass
silver spotted skipper - sheeps fescue grass, tufted hair grass
chequered skipper - upright brome grass, tor grass
dingy skipper - birds foot trefoil
grizzled skipper - wild strawberry, brambles, creeping cinquefoil and wild raspberry
Butterflies - Skippers (Hesperiidae)
Butterflies - Whites and yellows
​large and small white - wild and cultivated cabbage
green veined white - wild cabbage
wood white - bitter vetch, birds foot trefoil
brimstone - buckthorn, elder buckthorn
orange tip- creeping yellow cress, cuckoo flower, large bittercress, wild turnip, garlic mustard
​clouded yellow - clover lucerne birds foot trefoil
​pale clouded yellow -clover,lucerne
Berger's clouded yellow - horseshoe vetch, crown vetch
Butterflies - Aristocrats (Nymphalidae)
small tortoiseshell - stinging nettle
large tortoiseshell - elm, sallow, willow, cherry
purple emperor - sallow
peacock - stinging nettle
painted lady -thistle, burdock, mallow, stinging nettle
Camberwell Beauty - does not breed in UK
comma
nettle, hop vines
red admiral - nettle, hop vines, pellitory
white admiral - honeysuckle
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Fritillaries (Nymphalidae)
heath fritillary-cow wheat
marsh fritillary - devils bit scabious, plantain,fox-glove, wood sage, honey-suckle
pearl bordered fritillary - woodland violet
small pearl bordered fritillary - woodland violet
dark green fritillary - dog violet
silver washed fritillary - dog violet
Queen of Spain fritillary - violets, borage, sainfoin
Glanville fritillary - sea plantain, ribwort plantain
hugh brown fritillary - dog violet, sweet violet
Duke of Burgundy fritillary - primrose, cowslip
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common blue - birdsfoot trefoil,restharrow,clover
silver studded - gorse, birdsfoot trefoil,heather
chalk hill blue and Adonis blue - horseshoe vetch
​short tailed blue- birds foot trefoil, medick
long tailed blue - wild and cultivated peas
small blue - kidney vetch
large blue - thyme
brown argus - rock rose, common storks bill
northern brown argus - rock rose
holly blue - holly, ivy
black hairstreak, brown hairstreak - sloe (blackthorn)
green hairstreak - gorse, broom,bramble
purple hairstreak oak, sallow,sweet chestnut
white letter hairstreak which elm, common elm
small copper - sorrel, dock
Butterflies - Blues, hairstreaks & copper
Butterflies - Browns
meadow brown - grasses
gatekeeper -meadow grass, couch grass
small heath - grasses
large heath - sedges, fescues, cotton grass
ringlet -grasses
Scotch argus - grasses
small mountain ringlet - mat grass
wall brown - grasses
speckled wood - grasses inc couch grass, cocks foot
marbled white - grasses
grayling - grasses​
Individuals
Monarch - milk weed, swallowtail - milk parsley