It Never Rains But It Pours

I've not been using rain guards on my moth traps recently - bearing in mind the hot sunny days. Last night, as I was falling asleep on the sofa at 23:30, I half heard a weather man on the telly say "cloud will build up early morning with a chance of rain"... So I stumbled outside and attached the rain guards... good job too!

When my alarm went off at 4am, it was absolutely BUCKETING down!!!! I rushed outside, covered over both traps - and I'm now drying everything out!! When I went to bed last night, their were MASSES of moths about, but whenever it rains, any moths resting outside the traps disappear to find shelter. I reckon if it hadn't have rained I would have had another 100+ moths this morning :-(

I have three nights of trapping to mention, as I've already spoken about last night this is where I shall start...

166 moths of 48 species included no new for the garden! But it did include: 28 Heart and Dart, 12 Heart and Club, 9 Flame Shoulder, 9 Dark Arches, 8 Minor sp., 7 Willow Beauty, 7 Elephant Hawkmoth, 7 Buff Arches, 6 Brimstone, 5 Grey Dagger, 4 Pug sp., 4 Flame, 4 Bright-line Brown-eye, 4 Uncertain, 3 Common Marbled Carpet, 3 Riband Wave, 3 Pale Tussock, 3 Buff Ermine, 3 Clouded Brindle, 3 Treble Lines, 2 Purple Bar, 2 Double Square-spot, 2 Large Yellow Underwing, 2 Sycamore, and singles of: Green Silver-lines, Common Emerald, Light Emerald, Silver-ground Carpet, Green Carpet, Small Seraphim, Common Pug, Double-striped Pug, Mottled Beauty, Eyed Hawkmoth, Magpie, White Ermine, Buff-tip, Pebble Prominent, Setaceous Hebrew Character, Dot Moth, Coronet, Lychnis, Mottled Rustic, Poplar Grey, Straw Dot, Spectacle, Fanfoot and Small Fanfoot.

Sunday night one trap gave me 96 moths of 30 species, this included a gorgeous first for the garden...

Barred Yellow

The rest of the catch was: 21 Heart and Club, 9 Riband Wave, 8 Uncertain, 7 Heart and Club, 6 Flame, 4 Common Marbled Carpet, 4 Willow Beauty, 4 Elephant Hawkmoth, 4 Buff Ermine, 3 Pug sp., 3 Dark Arches, 3 Flame Shoulder, 3 Straw Dot, 2 Eyed Hawkmoth, 2 Large Yellow Underwing, 2 Minor sp., 2 Coronet, 2 Spectacle, 2 Fanfoot and singles of: Foxglove Pug, May Highflyer, Scorched Wing, Brimstone, Buff Arches, Buff-tip, Grey Dagger, Small Clouded Brindle, Double-square Spot and Lychnis.

Rewinding back even more, and Friday night gave me 128 moths of 41 species. A new for the garden was this...

Small Clouded Brindle

The rest of the catch looked like: 22 Heart and Dart, 12 Heart and Club, 8 Minor sp., 7 Riband Wave, 7 Willow Beauty, 7 Uncertain, 6 Dark Arches, 4 Flame, 4 Bright-line Brown-eye, 3 Figure of Eighty, 3 Buff Arches, 3 Grey Dagger, 3 Flame Shoudler, 3 Straw Dot, 2 Common Marbled Carpet, 2 Pug sp., 2 Elephant Hawkmoth, 2 Buff Ermine, 2 White Ermine, 2 Double-square Spot, 2 Clouded Brindle, 2 Green Silver-lines, 2 Silver Y and singles of: Common Emerald, Pine Carpet, Sandy Carpet, Swallow-tailed Moth, Peppered Moth, Eyed Hawkmoth, Pebble Prominent, Buff-tip, Brown Silver-lines, Scorched Wing, Lychnis, Setaceous Hebrew Character, Small Angle Shades, Light Arches, Spectacle, Fanfoot and Snout.

Saturday day, after some very nice sun bathing on Lyme Regis beach, a Scarlet Tiger was nice to see near the Pitch and Putt course.

It's not just moths the garden has offered, as yesterday I saw a new butterfly for the year flying around the back garden...

Ringlet

I shall finish this post with a couple of photos of one of three young Barn Owls I ringed yesterday. They were at a regular nest site for this species near Stockland Mast.

Always a pleasure to handle this exquisite species :-)