Still waiting...

Still waiting for my autumn fix of migrants, but there have been a healthy amount of interesting garden moths to make trapping in recent nights worthwhile. I also passed my 400th species of moth for the garden at the end of September, with an Acleris schalleriana to the porch light.

Hoary Footman seems to be doing very well in the local area, and this is the 4th individual I've caught this year, after no records at all last year. Its worn state can be explained by its very late appearance in the trap, on the 3rd October...

The distinctive pale hindwing...

Deep-brown Dart...

Barred Sallow, a classic autumnal species...

 Black Rustic...



Blair's Shoulder-knot...

Acleris schalleriana...

Autumnal Fant-Rustic!

I have hardly trapped at all this autumn. We had a couple of warm nights a fortnight ago, but due to various reasons, I could not trap, which was rather frustrating. I managed to trap once last week, but the result was fairly poor, with just one true autumn species, a Lunar Underwing. However, with the weather taking a turn for the warm, I trapped last night and it was a brilliant haul. I got almost all the autumnal species I expect to get during the period in one go! Best was a brand new species to me, of a gorgeous Autumnal Rustic, which was much smaller than I expected.

September 26th:

12 Large Yellow Underwing

5 Lunar Underwing

3 Snout

3 Common Marbled Carpet

3 Svennson's Copper Underwing

3 Copper Underwing

2 Large Ranunculus NFY

1 Brimstone

1 Square-spot Rustic

1 Grey Pine Carpet

1 Spruce Carpet

1 Oak Nycteoline

1 Setaceous Hebrew Character

1 Pink-barred Sallow NFY

1 Black Rustic NFY

1 Barred Sallow NFY

1 Brindled Green NFY

1 Autumnal Rustic NFG

Pink-barred Sallow

Lunar Underwings (variation)

Large Ranunculus

Brindled Green

Black Rustic

Barred Sallow

Autumnal Rustic

Autumn moths at thier height

The weather seemed pretty perfect last night, and I managed a good catch, in fact probably the best I can possibly get at this time of year with my equipment. Amongst a haul of 18 moths of 11 species were a few new for the year.
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7th October:
5 Large Yellow Underwing
2 Large Ranunculus NFY
2 Black Rustic NFY
2 Red-line Quaker NFY
1 Yellow-line Quaker NFY
1 Pine Carpet
1 Dark Sword-grass NFY
1 Barred Sallow
1 Common Marbled Carpet
1 Turnip
1 Setaceous Hebrew Character
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Large Ranunculus

Dark Sword-grass

Black RusticYellow-line and Red-line Quakers