Welcome

Hello and welcome to my moth Blog. I now reside in a small village in East Cambridgeshire called Fordham. My Blog's aim is to promote and encourage others to participate in the wonderful hobby that is Moth-trapping.
Moth records are vital for building a picture of our ecosystem around us, as they really are the bottom of the food chain. They are an excellent early indicator of how healthy a habitat is. I openly encourage people to share their findings via social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter & Instagram.
So why do we do it? well for some people it is to get an insight into the world of Moths, for others it is to build a list of species much like 'Twitching' in the Bird world. The reason I do it....you just never know what you might find when you open up that trap! I hope to show what different species inhabit Cambridgeshire and neighbouring counties.
On this Blog you will find up-to-date records and pictures.
I run a trap regularly in my garden and also enjoy doing field trips to various localities over several different counties.
Please also check out the links in the sidebar to the right for other people's Blogs and informative Websites.
Thanks for looking and happy Mothing!

KEY

NFY = New Species For The Year
NFG = New Species For The Garden
NEW! = New Species For My Records

Any Species highlighted in RED signifies a totally new species for my records.

If you have any questions or enquiries then please feel free to email me
Contact Email : bensale@rocketmail.com

My Latest Notables and Rarities

Sunday, 31 July 2011

Copper Underwing & Svensson's Copper Underwing

The Palps theory is no longer a reliable key for seperating this species, nor is the underside of the hindwing suffusion, they are both evident in both Males and Females of the species.
Here is the correct way of telling these species apart which WT&L does not publish.
This information was sourced from a book Notuidae of Central Europe in Colin Plant's possession and we have had an afternoon going through his collection and proving this theory correct, this is also a much easier way of diagnosing.

Hope this helps and sorry to be a nuisance but but we do all want correct records at the end of the day.

Posted by Bennyboymothman at 19:48

2 comments:

  1. Skev31 July 2011 at 20:16

    Not sure the palps feature was ever claimed to be 100% reliable in isolation. Equally, the projections from the antemedian line has been noted and referenced as another feature that is not 100% reliable back in Skinner 2nd Edition. In fact - seems that all external features may not be 100%. If it weren't for the larval differences I'd say lump them!

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  2. Bennyboymothman31 July 2011 at 21:28

    Seemed 100% consistent with the specimens we had to go on, although a few more specimens could turn out to be 'spanner's in the works' who knows!

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