Weather had been cold and crap all week so nothing new to write about. But in the vain hope of trying to maintain some blogging momentum of sorts, here's a few randomly selected leaf mines from last autumn. I was quite pleased with capturing photos using the LED light pad I have to backlight the mines, and creating two or three photo collages to show the overall mine habitus and details of the mine and/or larva. I did loads of these (see my Bluesky feed), this selection is just because they are still on my desktop rather than neatly filed away ....
Not a moth, this one is coleopteran - Rhamphus oxyacanthae
Last night, for the first time in well over a year thanks to [lack of] health etc, I ventured out with traps into woodland. I headed to Gisborne's Gorse, what is essentially mixed woodland within the Charnwood Lodge LRWT reserve. It's not 'real' woodland though, it was created in the late 19th century and part of it is more like a large-scale landscaped garden (there are a couple of old houses within the planted area). With such a long hiatus, it meant it was also the first time my 'new' car has been loaded up with traps. I've had it [Cupra Born EV] since Jan 2024, and the x3 traps, gennie and cable reels easily fitted in though I had folded the seats down just in case.
I had no great expectations for the night, although I had a couple of hoped-for species. I was only intending to run the traps for three hours or so - no point going overboard so early in the season.
And so it was that I lit up around 18:15, and ran the traps until packing the last one around 21:45. There were still moths coming in to the traps and it was still c7°C at that time, but I wasn't seeing any increasing diversity. I'm sure if I'd run for longer I would have had more Noctuids and maybe one or two more species, but the eventual total was 204 of 18sp. which is pretty fair for this early in March.
The couple of hoped-for species were Spring Usher which I'd not seen since 2012, and Yellow Horned that I'd not seen since 2013. Mottled Grey was also on the radar, though I was sure I was too early for that. No sign of any Spring Usher to the traps though, quite possibly too late this year. But Yellow Horned was bang on, I ended up with x51 of them and all box-fresh. Other highest counts were x42 March Moth and x36 Oak Beauty.
Given the abundance of fallen and felled wood alongside the track, I opted to photograph a few whilst out using the ever-reliable TG-6 and light guide. Smaller micros came home though, including a couple for dissection.
Yellow Horned
Engrailed
Satellite
Tortricodes alternella
Oak Beauty
March Moth
Pale Brindled Beauty
Brindled Pug
The only surprise as such was not the species, but the context. This female Dotted Border was sat on top of one of the traps basking in the glow of the light. The trap was not directly underneath the canopy, so the only way it could be there would be being 'flown in' whilst in-cop with a male or simply walking towards the light and crawling up. Given I only saw one male Dotted Border, and that it was in a different trap, the latter explanation seems more likely but of course it's a guess.
Dotted Border
Not too many micros aside from several T. alternella.
Ypsolopha ustella
Agonopterix ocellana
Acleris ferrugana/notana [dissection pending]
In compiling this post, I've reminded myself what an absolute pain in the arse it is to keep editing image sizes etc on Blogger. I think I'd realised this before and stuck to uploading at 'view size' only, but Bluesky seems to screw images up that are not already sized up. So going forward, it's going to be quicker and less of a pfaff to just save the images in two sizes. It will mean that anything on here will revert to what you see is what you get - no bigger image when you click on one.
I imagine one or two read the blog title and were delighted horrified that I might include a Coldplay track. Fear not.
I suppose I should make an effort to update the garden moth list page on here sometime. Another NFG last night which (I think) brings it up to 766 species - not to shabby for a small suburban garden with no decent habitat close by, but a long time in the making.
Acleris literana last night was one I hoped would pop up, seems to have been scarcer in VC55 away from decent woodland than eg A. cristana and A. hastiana up until the last few years, but seems to be spreading well now like A. kochiella and A. logiana.
Acleris literana
The only other highlight as such was a NFY Twin-spotted Quaker, not annual here though a fair run of records 2018 - 2022.
Twin-spotted Quaker
Here's a cracking track from Fat Dog, you're welcome.
I expected the garden trap to be a bit busier than it was, with decent min. temps after a few warm days. But the stiff breeze that came with dusk probably affected it. 25 of 6sp. with nothing exciting.
Acleris cristana
Small Quaker
Common Quaker
Whilst I'm at it, here's a few odd moths from the garden earlier in the year ....
Clouded Drab (24/02/2025)
Hebrew Character (24/02/2025)
Dotted Border (01/02/2025)
Early Moth (18/01/2025)
Here's a properly great track from The Shamen back in 1987, before more crappy stuff they did [ie Ebeneezer Goode].
We enjoyed a couple of sunny hours this afternoon at Bradgate Park. Ostensibly it was to get our granddaughter Ellie out for some sun and fresh air walking along, but I took along a MOL pheromone lure and the TG-6, because it would be mad not too. With so many ancient oaks, and a fourth consecutive day of sunshine, I fully expected a result with the lure and I was not wrong ....
Pammene giganteana, to MOL lure
What I wasn't expecting though was Tortricodes alternella also apparently coming to the lure. I was just exposing the lure in an open pot for ease, and at the first spot I had x2 fluttering about the trunk close to the pot. I could not exclude the possibility that I'd disturbed them whilst milling about the trunk. But at a second spot, another came to the pot but I watched this one fly in from some distance. So genuinely attracted to the lure, or just coincidentally day-flying.
Tortricodes alternella, to MOL lure?
I also found a fair few Luffia lapidella f. ferchaultella with the deep crevices of gnarly oaks, easier to find than get good photographs of. All on the shadier side of the trunks.
Snaps from Titchwell on Monday 03/03/2025. This was a very regular site to visit on my annual birding calendar c30 years ago, and still feels like a special place despite the often big numbers of visitors. Even on Monday it was busy enough, and hide etiquette seems to have gone to shit with people babbling loudly about nothing to do with birds on view, no one asking for help or pointing anything out [despite clearly needing help!], and one couple loudly ferreting around to sort out their lunch in that they seemed to think was their private dining room.
