Many Moths!

Just a quick moth update - be nice to have this blog fully up-to-date!

Since my last mothing post I have run the trap at Mum and Dad's on five nights. And as to be expected with the nights cooling off and the year progressing, overall numbers are dropping but there's still heaps of variety and plenty of potential.  I'm ever hopeful of a garden Convolvulus Hawkmoth so don't expect any less trapping to take place over the next month - fingers crossed this is my year!

First up was the night of 22nd August which gave me 178 moths of 28 species. Lesser Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing, Vine's Rustic and Large Yellow Underwing were the top three species quantity-wise, with the pick of the catch quality-wise being two Orange Swift (don't see many of these here), Mocha and my first Canary-shouldered Thorn of the year...

Orange Swift

Canary-shouldered Thorn

My next trapping night was 25th August which gave me 184 moths of 28 species. Top three species in numbers same as the last catch (although in a different order, Vine's Rustic now top), with the highlights being singles of Dark Sword Grass, Mocha, L-album Wainscot, Chinese Character and three Silver Y....

Dark Sword-Grass

Chinese Character

I trapped the following night too because the weather looked so promising, this produced a much better 226 moths of 35 species.  Same top three species quantity-wise, with 75 Large Yellow Underwings making up a large percentage of the catch.  The highlight was, incredibly, my second Jersey Mocha in under a month (first HERE), along with singles of Maiden's Blush, Four-spotted Footman and Dark Sword Grass.

Jersey Mocha #2.  Although more battered around the edges than my first, what is there is brighter and fresher.

Maiden's Blush

Roll forward to 29th August (after a spell of poor weather) and 101 moths of 21 species trapped.  Setaceous Hebrew Character replaced Lesser Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing as the third most numerous species, with some nice snippets of quality from singles of Four-spotted Footman, Maiden's Blush, Silver Y, Small Mottled Willow and a lovely Portland Ribbon Wave...

Portland Ribbon Wave

Male Four-spotted Footman, not caught any females this year

Small Mottled Willow

And finally we come to my most recent catch, the night of 2nd September and the 176 moths of 22 species this gave me the following morning.  Same top three as the last catch and the highlights were singles of Silver Y, Dark Spectacle and Pale Mottled Willow...

An awful photo of a Pale Mottled Willow - sorry it's so rubbish, I was going to take more but it flew off!

Dark Spectacle - a classic example of one (and note three separate kidney marks, in Spectacle the two nearest the head are usually merged to make one big one)

Four New Moths!

I finished work on Sunday and was absolutely shattered, my intentions were nothing but food and sofa-based. But then I noticed how still it was outside, how warm it felt, with the final straw being the Country File weather forecast telling me the rest of the week was windy... I had to get a moth trap out! And boy am I glad I did...

I set a trap up at Mum and Dad's and in the morning was greeted by 285 macro moths of 51 species. So far fewer than the 'Mental Moth Night' of the week before, but the variety was impressive and included an amazing THREE new species for the garden and I!  I've been trapping here on and off for almost ten years, so as you can imagine new species don't crop off all that often - so three in one go is astonishing! 

One of them was really quite special, and actually not in the trap - I found it about 4 feet away in long grass.  Jersey Mocha is a proper 'moth mega', first UK record was in Dorset in 2003 and there's not been that many since, including only a couple in Devon as far as I'm aware...

Jersey Mocha - such a speckly moth!

Less nationally exciting, but for me equally exciting due to their amazing markings, were two stunning examples of The Mocha.  Although supposedly widely distributed in woodland habitat in the south, I've not had the pleasure of one before - what a beautiful little beast and here's both of them...

The Mocha # 1

The Mocha # 2

And the last newbie, but no means least, was a Least Carpet.  A tiny moth but again beautifully marked, and possibly another pretty good record as they're suppose to be largely restricted to the south east of the UK... 

Least Carpet with a Common Footman for size

There were a couple more immigrant species in the trap as well, with singles of Silver Y and my first Dark Sword Grass of the year...

Dark Sword Grass

Other notables from the trap included Scarce Footman, Four-spotted Footman, Cabbage Moth, Lychnis, Scorched Carpet and three Jersey Tigers.

As the title suggests there was a fourth new moth for me that day, thanks to Fran.  It was her first solo trapping attempt but thankfully she kept hold of the Broad-barred White.  Although apparently not a scarce species, I've never caught one before...

Broad-barred White; such a striking moth!

And again - another great moth!

Have a bit of bird news to post up, and some Odonata pics from the other day - but will leave all this for another day as it's time to hit the sack! Night all.