Wild native mustards were significant inclusive species and for our Small, Large, Green-veined and Orange-tip, white butterflies .
Pieris napi (Carl Linnaeus 1758) latin name clue
and
Pieris rapae (Carl Linnaeus 1758) latin name clue
A theory was that Brassica napus (“Oil seed rape”) was a species to develop by competing farmers over centuries, for higher crop yields, from the flower head, rather than a plant left with no leaves, looking like it might have been “raped” by different species of insect larvae.
What was the post 1758 genetics of Wild mustards, which our native butterflies had a slowly evolved full life cycle dependancy with, compared with Brassica napus, a crop yielded plant we knew in 2016?
It might have been advisable for Butterfly Conservation to like to see more older wild mustards grown, from ancient seed banks, for use in wild spaces, that butterflies were seen more frequently life cycle using, rather than hybrid mustards grown for less insect larvae damage (with more vague historical dependancies), where insects were only really needed or wanted for their pollinating abilities,
- River mole Esher, 2014. A river bank mustard with aesthetic appeal. Was that the best Mustard to be there?