Simply Red

So far this evening, I've had a very productive time sorting photos from the trap and working through a number of gen det confirmations - essentially adding several species to my PSL and my garden moth list at the same time. But I'll save that for another day.

You may recall that last weekend I unexpectedly added a couple of clearwings to the garden list. Since then, I've tried on a few days in the week with the MYO lure for Red-belted and the FOR lure for Red-tipped, both without success. The conditions yesterday were perfect for clearwing hunting, but I was frankly too knackered, hot and bothered to go out after the mothing expedition on Saturday night. I decided to try a couple of different lures in the garden to see if anything else might be attracted. I stuck out the VES lure again, but again Orange-tailed turned up quickly so I couldn't leave that out. I tried the HYL lure (intended for Raspberry Clearwing) but nothing was interested in a couple of hours. Next I hung out the CUL lure (intended for Large Red-belted). Within 15 minutes or so there was some action, but the small black insect darting around the trap was not going in so I swiped it in my net ....

So somehow, Red-belted Clearwing arrived when using the wrong lure - with no response to the supposed target lure. I've only seen Red-belted once before, a brief appearance to MYO but not lingering and not that bothered. Every other time I've tried MYO I've had no response. I left the CUL lure out but within another 10mins or so the trap had another two Red-belted so I pulled it in. From the pheromone luring Facebook group it seems that Red-belted is actually more attracted to the CUL lure than MYO - so perhaps I should try again at a few sites and see what happens.

Later in the day, after sleeping through most of the British Grand Prix ( I saw the first lap, nodded off during the red flagged stop and woke up with about three laps to go) I decided to try again with the FOR lure. The conditions were still perfect, and I've had success with this lure when out and about late in the afternoon / early evening. I wasn't too hopeful though and left the lure in the trap whilst I made a rudimentary effort at cleaning the dust and bird shite off of my car. An hour or so later, I checked the trap and ....

A single Red-tipped Clearwing, the fifth clearwing sp. new to the garden this year. Ironically, this is the one that I was most hopeful about!

The clearwing season is probably not going to last much longer, and I doubt there will by any others added to the garden list. Yellow-legged has resolutely failed to turn up but I can't keep leaving out VES anyway, Hornet Moth does not respond too well to the lure but will be over by now, and Six-belted is unlikely here despite being one of the commonest clearwing sp. But I think there is more to come from hanging out the lures, one way or another.

I imagine from the blog post title you were expecting me to post a link to some dirge from a ginger-haired Mancunian .... nope.