Drowning

I'm properly struggling with trying to get back to a normal work-life balance. I was intending to ease myself back into work, but three weeks in and my innate desire to have everything 'right' has almost tipped me right into a work-work mentality and I'm drowning. I've barely had time to log on to the home PC, let alone get out and do anything. I've been feeling knackered when I do get home, and given that the conditions have improved I've been compelled to run the garden light trap more which means earlier starts compounding the fatigue. I'm not complaining, I needed to get back into working for a living and I will, eventually, strike a balance and make time for R&R.

In the meantime, I did manage to get out into the square and find lots of stuff at the weekend, and as mentioned the light trap has started to produce some proper diversity - both lepidopteran and 'bycatch'. But I'm not going to offer anything like a comprehensive roundup, or even half-arsed summary. I'll share a few photos now, and I'll make some effort to get my records and lists up to date over the weekend.

Toadflax Brocade

Rhinocyllus conicus - swept from Spear Thistle

Epinotia bilunana

Ptinus sexpunctatus - light trap

Scorched Wing

Bordered Shieldbug - found by chance in garden

Rustic Shoulder-knot

Magdalis armigera - uncooperative individual swept from Ulmus sp.

Broken Barred-carpet

Orange Ladybird

Flame Carpet

Red-necked Stint, River Warbler etc etc - no intention of driving all over the shop for year ticks. Sulphur-bellied Warbler - meh.

Some torts

By far the best way to photograph moths is in natural light on natural substrates. But given that it's usually too bright, too dull, too windy or (sometimes) the moth is too valuable to lose, then often you're forced to photograph indoors with compensatory lighting. I've tried a few things over the years, and some were better than others. Currently, I'm trying out a couple of lamps with 45W 5500K compact fluorescent 'daylight' bulbs'. It's a far from ideal set-up, but certainly better than nothing and I'm getting used to it. The trick as always is getting the white balance set right (with photographers 'grey' card), using a tripod, selecting a suitable photography prop, putting the camera on self-timer mode and having the patience of a saint. It looks something like this (except with the camera on the tripod!).

Upturned mug to get the subject up to right height is optional .....

Here's some tortrixes from the garden traps - one thing I'm still guilty of is zooming in too far and losing some depth on the subject.

Epinotia bilunana

Notocelia trimaculana

Codling Moth

Notocelia cynosbatella

Marbled Orchard Tortrix

And this one's not a tortrix ....

Bryotropha affinis

The Moth Pics Part 1

WHITE-THROATED ROBIN - NOMFL :-(

Don't you just hate it when stonking mega rarities turn up on a Monday well out of range for a quick dash and grab. Ah well, there will be other ... mega rarities that I will never see in a month of Sundays.

The already bulging list from Charnwood Lodge has gone up by one - we missed Galium Carpet (NFY). I've updated the previous post to reflect this. I also forgot to mention that aside from the trapping results, there were literally 100s of lekking Gold Swifts over bracken whilst we deployed the kit. We are now pretty certain of the Monopis imella, Cydia cosmomorpha and Strophedra weirana IDs, but the Cydia illutana is up for debate and all four will get chopped to absolutely confirm. There is only one previous VC55 record of imella which came from the adjacent Warren Hills site in 2004. There is also only one previous VC55 record of Strophedra weirana, from Shenton last year.

No garden trapping over the weekend - too knackered to be getting up early and it was a tad windy on Saturday anyway. So nothing to catch up there, but I've got a few photos to upload this evening from Charnwood Lodge ....

Perinephela lancealis - a scarce VC55 Pyralid

Spatalistis bifasciana - six years on since I added this to the VC55 list

Aethes cnicana

Cochylis nana

Orthotaenia undulana

Apotomis turbidana

Epiblema sp. (scutulana/cirsiana/sticticana group)

..... and from the garden on 02/06/2011

Epinotia bilunana - a better marked individual

Epiblema cynosbatella

Clepsis consimilana

Extreme Garden Mothing

As part of my 20W CFL actinic trials, I need to run it on the same night as the 80W actinic combo trap. I can't literally run them side by side, but despite the size and location of the garden I have on occasion run 3 traps on a night. You would have to see the garden to fully appreciate and understand how ridiculous a proposition this is, but nevertheless ....

Last night I ran 3 traps. The usual 125W MV half way down the garden against the fence and facing the embankment, the 80W actinic / 11W standard CFL combo trap against the back of the house, and the new 20W CFL actinic tucked right at the bottom of the garden behind the shed. All out of direct line of sight of each other - unless you are a moth flying over the garden. This trial is still not ideal as whilst the traps are running in the same garden on the same night, there is obviously a positional variable to take into account. So, I'll have to run 3 traps in various combinations on a few nights and then do some highly complex statistical analysis. Or guesswork.

So for last night the total catch was a very healthy 165 of 51sp.
125W MV 52 of 26 (10 of which were in no other trap)
80W/11W actinic/CFL combo 79 of 32sp (16 of which were in no other trap)
20W CFL actinic 34 of 18sp (8 of which were in no other trap)

0017 Common Swift (Hepialus lupulinus) 10
0227 Skin Moth (Monopis laevigella) 1
0246 Tinea semifulvella 2 (NFY)
0263 Apple Leaf Miner (Lyonetia clerkella) 1
0293 Caloptilia syringella 1 (NFY)
0409b Argyresthia cupressella 2
0647 Brown House Moth (Hofmannophila pseudospretella) 1
0648 White-shouldered House Moth (Endrosis sarcitrella) 5
0874 Blastobasis lacticolella 2
0970 Barred Fruit-tree Tortrix (Pandemis cerasana) 2
0989 Timothy Tortrix (Aphelia paleana) 1 (NFY)
0998 Light Brown Apple Moth (Epiphyas postvittana) 2
1011 Pseudargyrotoza conwagana 3
1076 Celypha lacunana 13
1083 Marbled Orchard Tortrix (Hedya nubiferana) 2
1084 Hedya ochroleucana 1 (NFY)
1133 Epinotia bilunana 1 (NFY)
1174 Epiblema cynosbatella 1
1175 Bramble Shoot Moth (Epiblema uddmanniana) 3 (NFY)
1176 Epiblema trimaculana 2
1293 Garden Grass-veneer (Chrysoteuchia culmella) 1 (NFY)
1301 Crambus lathoniellus 1 (NFY)
1334 Scoparia ambigualis 2
1376 Small Magpie (Eurrhypara hortulata) 6
1392 Udea olivalis 2
1428 Bee Moth (Aphomia sociella) 2
1707 Small Dusty Wave (Idaea seriata) 2 (NFY)
1727 Silver-ground Carpet (Xanthorhoe montanata) 1
1728 Garden Carpet (Xanthorhoe fluctuata) 2
1764 Common Marbled Carpet (Chloroclysta truncata) 1
1819 Mottled Pug (Eupithecia exiguata) 4
1827 Freyer's Pug (Eupithecia intricata arceuthata) 1
1834 Common Pug (Eupithecia vulgata) 2
1860 Green Pug (Pasiphila rectangulata) 5
1931 Peppered Moth (Biston betularia) 1
1931 Peppered Moth [melanic form] (Biston betularia f. insularia) 1 (NFY)
1937 Willow Beauty (Peribatodes rhomboidaria) 2
1958 Clouded Silver (Lomographa temerata) 3
1961 Light Emerald (Campaea margaritata) 2 (NFY)
1981 Poplar Hawk-moth (Laothoe populi) 1 (NFY)
2060 White Ermine (Spilosoma lubricipeda) 1
2089 Heart and Dart (Agrotis exclamationis) 45
2092 Shuttle-shaped Dart (Agrotis puta) 1
2126 Setaceous Hebrew Character (Xestia c-nigrum) 2
2306 Angle Shades (Phlogophora meticulosa) 1
2326 Clouded-bordered Brindle (Apamea crenata) 1
2330 Dusky Brocade (Apamea remissa) 1
2333 Large Nutmeg (Apamea anceps) 4
2334 Rustic Shoulder-knot (Apamea sordens) 4
2337x Marbled Minor agg. (Oligia strigilis agg.) 4
2477 Snout (Hypena proboscidalis) 2 (NFY)
2492 Small Fan-foot (Herminia grisealis) 1 (NFY)

Tinea semifulvella

Hedya ochroleucana f. antennaefrazzledii

Epinotia bilunana

Light Emerald

Peppered Moth f. insularia

Ketton Quarry / Grange Top Quarry 11/06/2010

A combination of fatigue, kids school gala, kids parties and (shockingly bad) football has meant that this is a day late.

With the crappy weather last week, a planned mothing venture on Friday night was starting to look a bit optimistic. But things brightened and warmed up on the Friday afternoon and we decided to go ahead. The site was the Grange Top working quarry which is the big active quarry immediately adjacent to the old workings which are now part of the Ketton Quarry reserve. Back in 2005 Four-spotted was discovered on the working quarry, and this prompted a few visits to the site after being duly health and safety inducted. Aside from the Four-spotted, we recorded some great species at this site (mainly interesting micros like Epiblema grandaevana, Aethes tesserana and Celypha rosaceana). It was some time since the last visit so we were keen to check on the Four-spotted colony.

After being let in by the security guard we headed into the quarry to check out the sites we'd previously worked. That's when the original plans fell by the wayside. Firstly, an area I'd previously worked with great success was now a big freshly quarried hole. Absoloutely no way to access it even with a 4x4, let alone my Vectra estate. The next problem was that the area where the Four-spotted colony was (is?) was also inaccessible as the new routes through the quarry were flooded. Of course these issues do not affect the huge quarry tippers that were parked up at the quarry entrance.

I opted for the backup which was to run traps along the boundary track that runs between the old and new quarries. However even this was impacted as a new gate across the access point meant that I had to lug everything manually - bloody hell, haven't had to resort to that for a fair while. Unfortunately by the time we'd fannyed about and eventually got set up it was too dusky for any site shots.

Conditions were much better than in the week, but still not great. In fact whilst it stayed dry and the temps were okay to start, the light breeze progressively developed into strong wind. We ran a sheet, 4 x 125W MV traps and the 80W actinic in the boundary area from dusk to c01:00. Temps were c15°C - 11°C. The clear highlight was a superb Netted Pug.

Netted Pug

The other main highlight was Grass Wave (Ketton Quarry is the only site in VC55 where this species has been recorded), backed up by the increasing but still appreciated Coronet, Pale Oak Beauty, Treble Lines and Marbled White Spot. Plenty of firsts for the year, and good to see a few more micros on the wing. The overall catch of 252 of 80sp. was not too bad considering the wind.

Grass Wave

Yearticks:
0014 Ghost Moth (Hepialus humuli) 1
0726 Metzneria metzneriella 2
0770 Carpatolechia proximella 1
0874 Blastobasis lacticolella 2
0936 Cochylimorpha straminea 1
0937 Agapeta hamana 1
1133 Epinotia bilunana 1
1168 Gypsonoma sociana 1
1201 Eucosma cana 2
1219 Lathronympha strigana 1
1293 Garden Grass-veneer (Chrysoteuchia culmella) 4
1294 Crambus pascuella 1
1392 Udea olivalis 3
1742 Yellow Shell (Camptogramma bilineata) 1
1752 Purple Bar (Cosmorhoe ocellata) 1
1823 Netted Pug (Eupithecia venosata) 1
1867 Treble-bar (Aplocera plagiata) 6
1941 Mottled Beauty (Alcis repandata) 8
1944 Pale Oak Beauty (Hypomecis punctinalis) 3
1961 Light Emerald (Campaea margaritata) 2
1970 Grass Wave (Perconia strigillaria) 4
2069 Cinnabar (Tyria jacobaeae) 1
2087 Turnip Moth (Agrotis segetum) 5
2291 Coronet (Craniophora ligustri) 3
2380 Treble Lines (Charanyca trigrammica) 8
2422 Green Silver-lines (Pseudoips prasinana britannica) 2
2442 Beautiful Golden Y (Autographa pulchrina) 1
2477 Snout (Hypena proboscidalis) 4

Highest counts:
0017 Common Swift (Hepialus lupulinus) 26
2337x Marbled Minor agg. (Oligia strigilis agg.) 17
1776 Green Carpet (Colostygia pectinataria) 12
1301 Crambus lathoniellus 11
1727 Silver-ground Carpet (Xanthorhoe montanata) 11
1176 Epiblema trimaculana 9
2089 Heart and Dart (Agrotis exclamationis) 7
1958 Clouded Silver (Lomographa temerata) 6
2410 Marbled White Spot (Protodeltote pygarga) 6

Best of the rest:
0883 Mompha raschkiella 1
1501 Platyptilia gonodactyla 1
1652 Peach Blossom (Thyatira batis) 1
1904 Scorched Wing (Plagodis dolabraria) 1
1979 Lime Hawk-moth (Mimas tiliae) 1
1980 Eyed Hawk-moth (Smerinthus ocellata) 1
1991 Elephant Hawk-moth (Deilephila elpenor) 2

Adrian also ran a couple of 125W MV traps in the main quarry, albeit in fairly open and unpromising situations. Yearticks for me from these traps were:

1302 Crambus perlella
2216 Shark (Cucullia umbratica)
2322 Light Arches (Apamea lithoxylaea)
2330 Dusky Brocade (Apamea remissa)

Once we decided to pack up, things again started to go awry when Adrian's Discovery decided to go AWOL. The remote key fob packed up and the car would not disarm the immobiliser when opening the car using the key - blaring horn, flashing lights and no ignition. Feck. After an hour or so of this in between pulling in my traps, it was clear that the car was going nowhere. We had to drive out onto the main quarry in my car to retrieve the 2 traps and gennie. Luckily they were in fairly accessible spots so no getting stuck or trying to negotiate ridiculous inclines etc - however my car is now absolutely caked up in concrete-like limestone slurry. Proper hardcore mothing! It meant a late night though; I dropped Adrian off on the way home and by the time I'd checked a few IDs, fridged a few bits in pots and had cup of tea it was starting to get light. 03:45 - time for bed ......

Epinotia bilunana

Gypsonoma sociana

Lathronympha strigana

Eucosma cana

Coronet

Treble Lines

Beautiful Golden Y