Pouring and Prominents

What appaling weather we've been having.  I haven't trapped since March!  I thought it was worth trying last night after a reasonably warm day, although I was sure to fit the rain guard!  I got a nice selection including a new species for the garden.  Unsurprisingly, all but one were year ticks.  The new one was a Swallow Prominent.  I'm used to getting Lesser, but it was nice to get both together.  Unbelievably, despite it being quite a diverse (or be it not that numerous) catch, I didn't get a single Noctuid!

8th May:

5 Brindled Pug

3 Lesser Swallow Prominent NFY

1 Swallow Prominent NFG

1 Brimstone NFY

1 Red Twin-spot Carpet NFY

1 Waved Umber NFY

1 Peppered Moth NFY

1 Great Prominent NFY

1 Grey Pine Carpet NFY

1 Purple Thorn NFY

1 Currant Pug NFY

1 Maiden's Blush NFY

1 Brindled Beauty NFY

I also got loads of Twenty-plume Moths and this micro, Plutella porrectella:

Plutella porrectella

Brimstone

Swallow and Lesser Swallow Prominents

Brindled Beauty

Currant Pug

Great Prominent

Maiden's Blush

Purple Thorn

Peppered Moth

Waved Umber

Scorching Scarcities

Well, the April scorcher continues, and this seems to be encouraging a few goodies to show themselves in the garden. I took a little break from trapping for a few days, but that didn't stop the moths coming...

Whilst watering the borders a few days ago, a Buttoned Snout blasted out of the Ivy and luckily landed on the fence where I could pot it up. A garden first, and one of the rarer species I've caught here, although it does seem to have its Surrey stronghold in the gardens of the North-east of the county...

On the 20th, I caught a single Cydia strobilella flying in the afternoon sun. This is another Surrey notable, recorded from just 5 sites, but is probably under-recorded. There is also a Norway Spruce, its footplant, two doors down, which might explain its presence...

Back out with the 15w Actinic last night, and it was a good haul with 24 species. The highlights being...

Ochreous Pug...

Grey Dagger agg.

 Waved Umber...

Brimstone...

Caloptilia syringella...

Caloptilia populetorum...

... as well as a Small Dusty Wave and Swammerdarnia pyrella, both of which were a bit camera shy.

Not exactly a highlight, but we have been getting quite a few Twenty-plume Moths in the house when I haven't been trapping, and up until now I have never bothered to photograph them. Its easy to overlook them from a distance, but when you do look closely, the detail on each feather like plume is quite something...

April show-ers

This warm weather is encouraging more moths to emerge. There were large swarms of long-horn moths on our local oak trees. They were too high to photograph but could well have been Nematapogon swammerdamella. Below is a selection that came to my trap last night:

purple thorn

nut-tree tussock

iron prominent

flame shoulder

common quaker (a worn specimen which at first glance looked rather like a powdered quaker)

brimstone

And a waved umber from a couple of nights ago...

A Small Jewel arrives...

A good couple of nights, but I am yet to get my two hundredth garden moth. The weather is going to get warmer, so I can expect it soon hopefully.

Both nights were fairly clear, but with quite warm air, and I got 33 moths of 19 species on the 20th, and 54 moths of 23 last night. Best moths were the few new for the year of Mottled Beauty, Turnip, Double Square-spot, and the jewel in the crown, my second ever Small Angle Shades.

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Aggregate of 20th and 21st June:

27 Heart and Dart

8 Ingrailed Clay

5 Dark Arches

4 Brimstone

4 Treble Lines

3 Common Marbled Carpet

3 Scorched Wing

2 Grey Pug

2 Uncertain

2 Willow Beauty

2 Minor sp.

2 Common Pug

2 Light Emerald

1 May Highflyer

1 Dusky Brocade

1 Orange Footman

1 Green Carpet

1 Mottled Pug

1 Small Phoenix

1 Pebble Prominent

1 Brown Silver-line

1 Silver-ground Carpet

1 Mottled Beauty NFY

1 Brown Rustic

1 Flame Shoulder

1 Peppered Moth

1 Heart and Club

1 Flame Carpet

1 Small Angle Shades NFY

1 Double Square-spot NFY

1 Purple Clay

1 Marbled White Spot

1 Rustic

1 Turnip NFY

A colourful duo - Brimstone and Light Emerald

Double Square-spot

Small Angle Shades

Pretty Good Weekend So Far...

Study leave has been better than expected, and on the evenings when I haven't been out celebrating the end of school, I've been moth trapping for most of the night- like any normal teenager! ;-)

The weather hasn't been brilliant for moths in terms of no cloud cover... but the wind is low and the temperatures are high so I've been getting quite a few moths in the trap...

1 Light Brocade- Best moth so far this year

1 White Ermine- NFY

1 Maiden's Blush- NFY

1 Pale Tussock

2 Pale Mottled Willow

2 Brimstone

1 Shuttle-shaped Dart

In the way of Micro moths...

1 Bee Moth Aphomia sociella

5 Light Brown Apple Moth Epiphyas postvittana

1 Diurnea fagella

3 Pyrausta aurata- Swept from mint during the day

1 Crambus perlella- Disturbed on lawn

Light Brocade...

Maiden's Blush...

Pale Tussock...

White Ermine...

Brimstone...

And my personal favourite micro- Pyrausta aurata

I won't be waking up to any school tomorrow so it will be another night of moth trapping!