It was not an ideal night for trapping, a bit too windy and wet, but we still had a successful night with 59 moths of 32 species. We also had an enjoyable morning looking at the moths followed by some welcome bacon and egg buttys! These are the aims of the surveys, to enthuse and inform people about the moths lurking in their gardens, and to improve recording of moths in the Strettons area.
We had several new species, including the Lychnis. A noctuid moth which was found roosting close to Graham's trap.
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| Lychnis |
It is fair to say that the majority of the moths were found in Graham's 125w Robinson trap compared to my actinic heath trap. This is not surprising as the former is more powerful, but as we suspected there were a few different species in the actinic. One of these was a Common Wainscot, found on a final sweep of the grass.
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| Common Wainscot |
One of the most numerous species, and one which had not had a picture yet appear here, was the Beautiful Golden Y. We had seven of these around the traps. This was a particular interesting individual being unusually marked.
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| Beautiful Golden Y |
We also had a couple of migrants. Like some of our butterflies, we get moths which migrate to this country each year form the continent. One which is familiar to many people is the Silver Y, and we saw one of these. Another is the Diamond-back Moth, a small micro moth that appears in its thousands in the UK each year. One of these has made it to the Lawley.
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| Diamond-back Moth |
There were quite a few other new micro moths. This Coleophora albicosta was one of them. There are quite a few similar species, but as the scientific name suggests, this species has a white streak along the costa (forewing edge).
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| Coleophora albicosta |
So another successful survey was complete. We still have a few gardens to visit before we begin on our second sessions for some sites.
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