Weather or not to trap

No, that is not a spelling mistake!  There is not a  lot of sense in putting on the trap in very cold weather, although several people do so, and indeed the Rothamstead Institute traps are on every day!
But I normally do not bother unless the temperature is likely to stay above 5 or 6 degrees.
So the forecast for last night was for 6° and the trap went on.

Not a lot in there, but one new moth for us (a Dotted Border, pictured) and another moth to test our identification skills.

Dotted Border

I always thought the separation of the 3 "Brindled Beauties" was easy and in my post a few days ago I put up a photo which I called "Small". Earlier I had posted a photo of "Pale". You can look at these by clicking on the label list.

Mike said to me after the "Small" post that he would have named it "Pale" and this got me searching. However, the moth in the trap last night was very similar, and nothing like the "Pale" referred to above.

It just so happened that on Saturday there was the Shropshire Ento Day at Preston Montford (a superb day of great interest - thanks to all there) and so I took the moth with me to ask the experts - and there were several. And, in the end, it was decided that this is indeed a Pale Brindled Beauty, in spite of its at first sight very yellow appearance.  Have a look and see if you agree!



Pale Brindled Beauty