Another great garden catch

Another good catch last Monday night, around 40 species which is pretty good for here.

Warm days continued with temperatures peaking at around 25 degrees and lows of 14, perfect for mothing!

10 new for years was pleasing indeed, two confirmed by dissection, using my basic kit and a 20x hand lens and a bit of patience.
I picked out a jet black Rustic out of 5 in total, it was indeed a typical Lesser Common. Tawny Marbled is another that is fairly doable just brushing the end of the abdomen with a fine paint brush, another species added to the year list. 

Best moth of the night was a third garden record of Small Clouded Brindle, a bit of a shabby specimen unfortunately.

Garden species count for 2020 now upto 295.

250w Clear MV Robinson Trap min 14c at 5:00am

Only New For Year Species Reported

Catch Report - 22/06/20 - Back Garden - Stevenage - North Herts

Macro Moths

Common Rustic 4 [NFY]
Lesser Common Rustic 1 [NFY]
Scalloped Oak 1 [NFY]
Small Clouded Brindle 1 [NFY]
Tawny Marbled Minor 1 [NFY]


Micro Moths

Anania coronata 2 [NFY]
Eudonia lacustrata 2 [NFY]
Lozotaeniodes formosana 1 [NFY]
Spilonota laricana 1 [NFY]

Daytime

Anthophila fabriciana 1 [NFY] Found on Nettle patch in alleyway

Anania coronata

Common Rustic

Eudonia lacustrata

Lesser Common Rustic

Lozotaeniodes formosana

Scalloped Oak

Small Clouded Brindle

Friday night, out on the town?

Not quite, my garden is on the edge of town...
And that's about as near as I've got to the town besides driving past it on my way to work.

I can't remember the last time I went to Stevenage town to have a mooch around and do some shopping, not that i'm missing it too much mind! the shopping trip usually involves socks and lampshades (for the moth traps).

Back to the whole point of this blog before I career off into the sunset.

The Friday before (the 19th) was another warm day and there was plenty of moth action around the trap after rolling out of bed at 4am to get the jump on the bird predation.

A slightly reduced catch compared to recent nights, but still several new species added to the year list.

Pick were two fresh Rustics and a slightly aberrant Treble Brown Spot which was really yellow in appearance with reduced central markings in the band.

Garden species count for 2020 now upto 285.

250w Clear MV Robinson Trap min 13c at 4:00am

Only New For Year Species Reported

Catch Report - 19/06/20 - Back Garden - Stevenage - North Herts

Macro Moths

Barred Yellow 1 [NFY]
Pebble Hook-tip 1 [NFY]
Rustic 2 [NFY]
Swallow-tailed Moth 1 [NFY]
Treble Brown Spot 1 [NFY]

Micro Moths

Acrobasis repandana 1 [NFY]
paraswammerdamia nebulella 1 [NFY]

Acrobasis repandana

Barred Yellow

Paraswammerdamia nebulella

Pebble Hook-tip

Rustic

Swallow-tailed Moth

Treble Brown Spot

Catch report - 17/06/20

Starting to work through my catch reports from the last ten days here in Stevenage, North Herts.. some really great catches and even new species for the garden.

I start way back on the 17th of June!

An array of usual suspects graced the 250w lighthouse trap (owing to how bright the damn thing is).

Best moth of the night was a stunning Leopard Moth, a species that isn't annual here.

Less stunning, was a really Battered Burnished Brass, usually such a pretty species...poor thing.

Another notable moth was a form of Heart & Club that I've never seen before.

And to finish, two forms of Spilonota ocellana were trapped and were compared with a specimen of Spilonota laricana beaten from Larch out in woodland last week.

Garden species count for 2020 now upto 278.

250w Clear MV Robinson Trap min 12c at 4:00am

Only New For Year Species Reported

Catch Report - 17/06/20 - Back Garden - Stevenage - North Herts

Macro Moths

Beautiful Hook-tip 1 [NFY]
Burnished Brass 1 [NFY]
Fan-foot 1 [NFY]
Leopard Moth 1 [NFY]
Scarce Footman 1 [NFY]

Micro Moths

Hypsopygia glaucinalis 1 [NFY]
Spilonota ocellana 2 [NFY]
Zeiraphera isertana 1 [NFY]

Beautiful Hook-tip

Burnished Brass

Fan-foot

Heart & Club aberration

Hypsopygia glaucinalis

Leopard Moth

Scarce Footman

Spilonota ocellana

Spilonota ocellana

Zeiraphera isertana

Best catch of the year and then a big drama!

Pick of just over 300 species out at Chippenham Fen last night, with several still to check (My highest ever species count in one night), Flame Wainscot (new for me) and Gelechia muscosella (The 2nd time I have trapped this rare species here). The bad news, these were the only photos I could take. My camera is now dead, got extremely hot and maybe overheated...threw loads of errors and won't turn on now :( replacement expected on Tuesday.

Flame Wainscot

Gelechia muscosella

I have some catching up to do!

A catch from last Tuesday here in my garden, was pretty damn good! and another load of year listers were added to the 2020 garden list.

Highlights for me were, Red-necked Footman (Never annual here), Poplar Grey (Again, an uncommon moth in my garden with just a handful of records over the last 8 years), and Coronet, a species that is becoming much more frequent in my garden in recent years, such a lovely looking moth.
Scrobipalpa costella had not been seen here since 2015!

There is one Cnephasia sp to check which could be a new species for the garden. All in due course!

9 new species were added to the running total.

Garden species count for 2020 now upto 270.

250w Clear MV Robinson Trap min 13c at 4:00am

Only New For Year Species Reported

Catch Report - 16/06/20 - Back Garden - Stevenage - North Herts

Macro Moths

Common White Wave 1 [NFY]
Coronet 1 [NFY]
Poplar Grey 1 [NFY]
Red-necked Footman 1 [NFY]

Micro Moths

Crambus perlella 1 [NFY]
Euzophera pinguis 1 [NFY]
Gypsonoma dealbana 1 [NFY]
Scrobipalpa costella 1 [NFY]
Tischeria ekebladella 1 [NFY]

Common White Wave

Coronet

Crambus perlella

Euzophera pinguis

Gypsonoma dealbana

Poplar Grey

Red-necked Footman

Scrobipalpa costella

Tischeria ekebladella

Field Trip - Bramfield Woods - 13/06/20

On the same night as I ran the trap at work, I also went out to Bramfield Woods to see what we could find.

It had been a nice warm day and with a little bit of cloud bubbling up, it looked quite promising.

Unfortunately before arriving, there had been a sharp downpour of rain and the vegetation was extremely damp.

From experience, this is never a goo sign at dusk! Moth seems quite reluctant to fly once wet, and with little or no time to dry off before night time, they quite often are found lying in situ for the rest of the night.

 

But luckily, it wasn't a total loss, we did manage plenty of moths, but numbers were a bit down and the variety slowed up at around midnight when we decided to pack up the traps slowly.

 

There were some really nice species including Gold Swift, Satin Beauty, Rosy Footman and Blue-bordered Carpet.

 

The micros however, were more interesting! I managed two new species for my records, Pexicopia malvella (The Hollyhock Seed Moth) & Epinotia cruciana (The Willow Tortrix).

 

I was chuffed to bits to say the least. The latter would not settle on my bark background, so a pot shot had to suffice, I tried a little bit of (cheating) photoshop!

 

Below are the results.

Catch Report - 13/06/20 - Bramfield Woods - Central Herts - 7 traps - 2x 125w MV Trap, 1x 160w MBT Trap, 2x 250w Clear MV Robinson Trap, 1x LED Battery Trap &P 1x 40w U-Tube + 15w Actinic tube & 15w Synergetic tube Trap

75 Macro species & 64 Micro species - 139 species in total

 

Macro Moths

 

Angle Shades
Barred Yellow
Beautiful Golden Y
Beautiful Hook-tip
Blood-vein
Blotched Emerald
Blue-bordered carpet
Bordered White
Brimstone Moth
Brown Rustic
Brown Silver Line
Buff Ermine
Cinnabar
Clouded Border
Clouded Silver
Common Carpet
Common Emerald
Common Footman
Common Swift
Common Wainscot
Common White Wave
Coxcomb Prominent
Dark Arches
Engrailed
Fan-foot
Flame Shoulder
Ghost Moth
Gold Swift
Great Oak Beauty
Green Carpet
Green Silver Lines
Grey Arches
Grey Pine Carpet
Heart & Dart
Ingrailed Clay
Iron Prominent
Large Yellow Underwing
Lesser Yellow Underwing
Light Emerald
Lobster Moth
Maiden's Blush
Marbled Brown
Marbled Minor
Marbled White Spot
Mottled Beauty
Oak Hook-tip
Orange Footman
Pale Oak Beauty
Pale Prominent
Pale Tussock
Peach Blossom
Peacock Moth
Peppered Moth
Pine Hawk-moth
Poplar Hawk-moth
Poplar Lutestring
Red-necked Footman
Riband Wave
Rosy Footman
Rustic Shoulder-knot
Sandy Carpet
Satin Beauty
Scorched Wing
Silver Y
Small White Wave
Small Yellow Wave
Snout
Spectacle
Straw Dot
Tawny Marbled Minor
Tawny-barred Angle
Treble Brown Spot
Treble Lines
Turnip Moth
Yellow Shell

 

Micro Moths

 

Acentria ephemerella
Acrobasis consociella
Acrobasis repandana
Agapeta zoegana
Anania lancealis
Aphomia sociella
Apotomis capreana
Apotomis turbidana
Archips crataegana (1 F)
Archips podana
Archips xylosteana
Argyresthia goedartella
Assara terebrella
Bryotropha terrella
Carpatolechia proximella
Celypha lacunana
Celypha striana
Chrysoteuchia culmella
Cnephasia sp
Cochylis hybridella
Cochylis molliculana
Coleophora albidella
Crambus lathoniellus
Cydia fagiglandana
Ectoedemia subbimaculella
Elachista triatomea
Elegia similella
Emmetia marginea
Epinotia bilunana
Epinotia cruciana
Epinotia immundana
Epinotia nanana
Epinotia rubiginosana
Epinotia subocellana
Eucosma cana
Eucosma hohenwartiana
Glyphipterix forsterella
Grapholita funebrana
Gypsonoma oppressana
Hedya nubiferana
Hedya pruniana
Homoeosoma sinuella
Lathronympha strigana
Lozotaeniodes formosana
Monopis weaverella
Morophaga choragella
Nemophora degeerella
Notocelia trimaculana
Notocelia uddmanniana
Pandemis cerasana
Pandemis heparana
Parapoynx stratiotata
Paraswammerdamia nebulella
Paraswammerdamia pyrella
Pexicopia malvella
Phycita roborana
Prays fraxinella
Scoparia ambigualis
Scythropia crataegella
Spilonota laricana
Strophedra weirana
Tischeria eklebladella
Tortrix viridana
Udea olivalis 

 

Argyresthia goedartella

Assara terebrella

Coleophora albidella

Elegia similella

Epinotia cruciana

Gold Swift

Pexicopia malvella

Rosy Footman

Satin Beauty

 

Field Trip - Gadespring Watercress Beds - 13/06/20

I left a Robinson trap running overnight at one of works fantastic wetland reserves.

 

The day had been warm and humid, but rather windy at times, an the evening was a little blustery with clear spells.

Nevertheless, come the morning there were plenty of moths to look at.

 

I was in a bit of a rush, so just noted a species count.

 

Below are the results.

 

Catch Report - 13/06/20 - Gadespring Watercress Beds - West Herts - 1x 125w MV Robinson Trap
 

Total : 73 species

Macro Moths

Beautiful Hook-tip
Bright-line Brown-eye
Buff-tip
Burnished Brass
Buttoned Snout
Cinnabar
Clouded Border
Clouded Silver
Common Pug
Common Swift
Common White Wave
Coronet
Coronet
Dark Arches
Double-striped Pug
Elephant Hawk-moth
Eyed Hawk-moth
Flame
Flame Carpet
Garden Carpet
Ghost Moth
Grass Rivulet
Grey Pug
Haworth's Pug
Heart & Club
Leopard Moth
Light Arches
Light Emerald
Marbled Minor
Middle-barred Minor
Mottled Rustic
Pale Prominent
Poplar Hawk-moth
Riband Wave
Rustic Shoulder-knot
Setaceous Hebrew Character
Shears
Shoulder-striped Wainscot
Silver Y
Silver-ground Carpet
Small Clouded Brindle
Smoky Wainscot
Snout
Spectacle
Straw Dot
Treble Lines
Uncertain
White Ermine
Willow Beauty

Micro Moths

Amblyptilia acanthadactyla
Anania hortulata
Archips podana
Argyresthia goedartella
Celypha lacunana
Chrysoteuchia culmella
Clepsis spectrana
Cnephasia sp
Coleophora sp TBC
Crambus lathoniellus
Crambus perlella
Elachista maculicerusella
Elachista stabilella
Emmelina monodactyla
Ephestia sp
Epiphyas postvittana
Eudonia mercurella
Eudonia pallida
Metzneria lappella
Notocelia trimaculana/roseocolana
Pandemis cerasana
Pleuroptya ruralis
Plutella xylostella
Udea olivalis

125w MV Robinson Trap overlooking the pond

Clepsis spectrana

Elachista stabilella

Flame Carpet

Garden Carpet

Grass Rivulet

Leopard Moth

Metzneria lappella