A Lunar-tics O-pinion

Conditions last night were not ideal, as it had not been a particularly warm day, and cloud cover was at a minimum. Some nice moths were caught in the garden however, including a few new for the year. Best was my second record of Lunar-spotted Pinion. Interestingly, my first record was on the very first night I ever trapped in the garden, two years ago to the day!

July 1st:
7 Dark Arches
6 Riband Wave
6 Rustic
4 Heart and Dart
4 Uncertain
3 Willow Beauty
3 Light Arches
3 Turnip
2 Mottled Beauty
2 Flame
2 Heart and Club
2 Dot Moth
1 Double-striped Pug
1 Lunar-spotted Pinion NFY
1 Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing NFY
1 Beautiful Hook-tip
1 Large Yellow Underwing
1 Mottled Rustic
1 Bird's Wing
1 Shears
1 Snout NFY
1 Minor sp.
1 Buff Ermine NFY
1 Garden Carpet
1 Bright-line Brown-eye NFY
1 Small Seraphim

Bright-line Brown-eye

Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing

Rustic (right this time?)

Buff Ermine

Lunar-spotted Pinion

Pugtastic

Last night was the first warm cloudy one for a couple of weeks, so it worth running the trap. Numbers were a little dissapointing, but included an array of Pugs, all but one of which I managed to identify! One of the Green Pugs was very fresh, but by the time I had had it potted for a little while, it started to loose its green! The same can be said for the July Highflyer too. I also found a very pretty micro flying around in the day, that I would appreciate an ID for.

June 14th:

15 Heart and Dart

4 Rustic

3 Green Pug NFY

2 Dark Arches

2 Willow Beauty

2 Common Pug

1 Foxglove Pug NFY

1 Grey Pug

1 Fan-foot NFY

1 Small Fan-foot NFY

1 July Highflyer NFY

1 Marbled White-spot

1 Small Dusty Wave NFY

1 Brimstone

1 Uncertain NFY

Sorry for some of these poor shots, but I wasn't having much luck persuading them to sit where I wanted!

Unidentified micro

Green Pug

Small Dusty Wave

July Highflyer

Small Fan-foot

Fan-foot

Rustic

Mega moths!

Wow, what a night, this is what mothing is all about.

I woke up at 4:00 this morning, expecting the trap to be full of water! Amazingly, this area avoided the rain, but got the moths. The final tally of 93 moths of 41 species is massively bigger than anything before, and it took me a couple of hours to sort them out. There were also plenty of Cockchafers and Ichumen wasps in the trap too, and that certainly made the rumage interesting!

The couple of brand new species to me were Broken-barred Carpet and the Seraphim, but there were also loads of new-for-gardens and new-for-years.

5th June:

12 Heart and Dart
9 Common Marbled Carpet
5 Mottled Pug
4 Brown Silver-lines
3 Oak-tree Pug
3 Shuttle-shaped Dart
3 Peppered Moth
3 Flame Shoulder
3 Scorched Wing NFG
3 Green Carpet
3 May Highflyer
3 Common Pug
2 Brimstone
2 Spruce Carpet
2 Minor sp.
2 Heart and Club
2 Buff-tip
2 Pale Prominent
2 Red Twin-spot Carpet
2 Orange Footman
2 Maiden's Blush
2 Light Brocade
2 Flame NFY
2 Treble Lines
1 Small Phoenix
1 probable Grey Pug NFG
1 probable Seraphim NFG
1 Coxcomb Prominent
1 Grey Pine Carpet
1 Small Serphim
1 Alder Moth
1 Coronet NFY
1 V-Pug NFY
1 Spectacle
1 White Ermine
1 Snout NFY
1 Ingrailed Clay
1 Flame Carpet
1 Marbled Brown NFG
1 Broken-barred Carpet NFG
1 Rustic NFY
1 White-spotted Pug

V-Pug

The Flame

Small Seraphim

probable Seraphim

Scorched Wing

Rustic

faded Red Twin-spot Carpet

Minor (probably Marbled)

Marbled Brown (honestly!)

Coronet

Broken-barred Carpet,