Turned out nice: hot summer makes it a vintage year for wildlife across the UK

After six consecutive years in which awful weather had blighted the UK'swildlife, 2013's cheerful summer turned around the fortunes of flora and fauna across the country, an annual audit has found.

The heat of July and August was a particular fillip for insects that thrive in the warm, such as butterflies, moths, bees, crickets and grasshoppers, according to the National Trust, which publishes its report today of how the weather affected the natural world.

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Hot summer helps boost butterflies

UK butterfly numbers have benefitted from the long spells of warm weather this summer, according to a nationwide survey.

The annual Big Butterfly Count attracted a record 46,000 participants who spotted a total of 830,000 insects.

The small white was at the top of the list of sightings, followed by the large white and the peacock.

Conservationists described the results as a relief following the washout summer of 2012.

The survey, organised by charity Butterfly Conservation, invited the public to count how many of 21 common species they can see in a 15 minute period and ran from 20 July to 11 August.

The sustained warm weather over the summer provided "perfect" conditions for a boom in butterflies and day-flying moths according to experts.

"Put simply, butterflies are cold-blooded creatures that rely on the warmth of the sun in order to be active," said Butterfly Conservation's survey manager Richard Fox.

"The hot summer this year meant that some butterfly species, which were in their early life cycle stages when the heatwave began were able to capitalise on it giving rise to high numbers of adults during the count in late July and early August."

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