The Small Heath is quite scarce locally, usually with just one or two individuals being seen at a time. I have seen localised colonies at the Devil's Dyke, Newmarket and on Therfield Heath, Royston.
It produces two broods per year, with adults on the wing from May to September with peaks in June and August. The larval foodplants are various grasses, and it over-winters as a larva.

Unlike the Gatekeeper the undersides of the resting wings show only one, not two white spots in the large black fore-wing spot. The arrangement of the spots on the hind-wings is also different from the Gatekeeper and from the Meadow Brown. The upper sides of the wings lack the dark edgings of those two species.