Pincer movement

The Strettons Area Community Wildlife Group 'moths in YOUR garden' surveys continued on Saturday night. This time we went for a pincer movement, with both Graham and I taking our traps up to a site near The Lawley.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

Where do cinnas drink?

No, that is not a spelling mistake and it it not a reference to our evening in the Bucks Head! Answer is of course in a Cinnabar, and I was pleased to get one in my trap last night. There has been a lot of activity and my trap on Sunday night and last night has produced some quite pretty and very different moths, as hopefully you will see from the photos below. It is interesting that with only a couple of miles between our traps and the fact that we are in similar environments, we are often getting a different selection of moths, though there are those in common too. So, I will not mention the two Small Elephant Hawk-moths I got last night.

Sunday night produced the following new moths for me here: White-pinion Spotted, Scorched Wing and Small Phoenix (all geometrids).

White-pinion Spotted

Scorched Wing

Small Phoenix

                                                                   

There were a couple of micros on the front lawn and they were Diamond-back Moths and they are "important" because they are immigrants, sometimes arriving in the UK in large numbers and can breed here - and from reports from Yorkshire, this seems to be a bumper year. (Not a good photo I'm afraid).

Diamond-back Moth

This morning, as on Monday morning, the most numerous "thing" in the trap was Cockchafer beetles! However, there were some more pleasant surprises.

First was a different Nematopogon (longhorn) moth N. schwartziella (cf. my previous post) this one being a bit smaller and slightly darker.

Nematopogon schwartziella

Star of the show for me was the above mentioned Cinnabar. You will have seen its caterpillars, with black and yellow bands, feeding on ragwort. There was also a Buff Ermine as well as a White Ermine.

Cinnabar

Buff Ermine

There was an Orange Footman too, not really a surprise, but 10 years ago it would have been "a suspected immigrant", but now seems to live throughout the UK.

Orange Footman

Then there was a Pug - a species of moth which are considered very difficult to identify easily. Fortunately there are a few which are easy, and this included the Foxglove Pug - you may look back and find a photo of its caterpillar.

Foxglove Pug

Swallow Prominent, Muslin Moth, White Ermine and Spectacle and last but not least was a Common Swift, reminding me that I have lived here more than 9 months now and that most of the moths in the future may be repeats - though there are still several hundreds to find!

Swallow Prominent

Muslin Moth

Spectacle

Common Swift