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, I have now removed commenting as the bots were starting to appear
Contact Email : bensale@rocketmail.com

My Latest Notables and Rarities

Sunday, 14 July 2019

One new moth and one new garden moth!

Thursday night was again a busy night in the garden moth trap, and another 6 new for year species were added.
Of the 6, one was a completely new moth for me! A Dotted Rustic, and never really a moth that I would have expected to see in my garden, let alone Herts, I think it's only the 4th modern record for Herts (post-2000).
Copied from an email from Colin Plant 

''I can confirm this ID. Unsure is this is a Scottish one starting to recolonise again (they do this every 50 years or so – it was common in Herts in the 1970s and 1980s – so getting on for 40 years ago), or if it is a Continental immigrant?''

Just where it came from I don't know, but I was just glad I spotted it amongt the 80% of brown moths in the trap at the moment.

I also recorded a garden first Cnephasia longana, one of the easier Cnephasia to identify.

Herald was rather a late addition to the yearly roster, a moth I see usually in Spring each year.

Garden species count for 2019 now upto 319.






















Catch Report - Back Garden - Stevenage - 250w Clear MV Robinson Trap

11/07/19

Macro Moths

Dotted Rustic 1 [NEW!]
Herald 1 [NFY]

Micro Moths

Acleris forsskaleana 1 [NFY]
Cnephasia longana 1 [NFG]
Rhopobota naevana 1 [NFY]
Yponomeuta sp 1 [NFY]

Acleris forsskaleana

Cnephasia longana

Dotted Rustic

Herald

Rhopobota naevana

Yponomeuta sp
Posted by Bennyboymothman at 22:43