Whilst searching through photos for something else amongst my oldest images I found the following ....
I double-checked the record date (22/07/2001), and I had a vague recollection
that this was more interesting than just being a new moth for me and the
garden (which back then would have included many species). So I checked the
VC55 records and, as I thought, it was indeed a first VC55 record of
Agonopterix conterminella (or at least the first post-VCH record: Vol. 1 of the Victoria County History of Leicester that includes a Natural History section was published in 1907, and includes a simple list of species known to have been recorded within Leicestershire, although there are no detailed records included. The VCH for Rutland was published in 1906 and is even more sparse).
This got me thinking: over the last 20 years or so I have added a fair number
of moth species to the VC55 list, and in more recent years a few species in
other orders too. As time has gone on many of
these (like this Agonopterix) will have slipped out of my mind although the
records exist for posterity. So I'm going to spend a bit of time over the next
few weeks trying to compile a list of the firsts and any other significant
records that I am associated with. I'll primarily focus on records that are
solely mine, but also detail important records where others were involved
(essentially these will be moths that I caught or identified but as part of a
group effort). Once I've got a reasonable list as a starting point I'll set up
a new page tab and update accordingly. It might seem a bit of a vanity
project. Yeah, I suppose it is. And?
Aside from that revelation, this particular species also falls into the
'Overdue' category for my garden moth records. I had one further individual on
10/07/2007 but not a sniff of one since. However it has only been recorded
from four other sites in VC55, and seems to have a patchy distribution despite
the main foodplants being sallow.
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