Let Me Down

So as some may have picked up from posts on Twitter and Facebook, or my comment on the last post, my planned surgery did not happen. Which was bloody frustrating to say the least, and left me feeling a bit bewildered after having got myself psyched up and ready. I'd spent a couple of hours in the surgery pre-prep area being checked, interrogated and having had a chat with the surgeon - during which he helpfully told me that my pre-op scans had shown that the x3 growths had indeed grown a bit more during the c4wks since the last scans. The op is very high risk, mainly due to excess bleeding, sepsis, possible damage caused by the surgery etc, so they absolutely know I will be in ICU for a couple of days. The op is also a long procedure, at least 8hrs. So to go ahead, the team of surgeons/consultants involved (there are four completing various parts of the surgery within their area of specialism) all need to be available, the theatre needs to be triple-booked for the longer time, and there needs to be a confirmed ICU bed available. They can plan the surgeons and theatre, ICU is completely down to chance and given that the hospital has the only A&E department in Leics. then it is always likely to be busy. So I was left thinking the worst - what if the next date is another six or seven week wait, will that be too late to have the best chance of success ....

Once I'd had something to eat and drink, and pottered in the garden sunshine, I pulled myself together enough to nip out for a brief walk at Croft Hill. Whilst out I remembered that I had a ticket to see Gary Numan that I'd obviously expected to miss and had not been able to pass on. So when I got home I decided to sort myself out, get the moth trap set and bugger off for a beer and some noise. A great gig, and complete contrast to the more sedate and intricate Divine Comedy gig I'd been to the previous weekend.

Anyway, I got a call from the hospital yesterday and have a new date - 15th June. Not as soon as I'd like but at least not as far off as I feared. I'm back to how I was before this debacle and just focussing on the now, including getting back to work after a week out.

The moth trap on Thursday night was fairly busy, but best of the bunch was a not particularly spectacular looking pug ....

Angle-barred Pug (f. fraxinata = Ash Pug)

I nearly overlooked this in the early morning light, but noticed the straight costa, narrow long-winged look and that the weak markings were a bit too uniform to be due to wear. Of course in decent light and with a fully awake mind it's obvious what it is - though I wonder if I've overlooked it in the past. A first for the garden and the first I've seen in VC55, having only seen it previously in Devon.

A few others from the trap ...

Oak Hook-tip

Lime Hawk-moth

Flame Carpet

I pointed the camera at a couple of bits up at Croft Hill too. Back on 12th May whilst unsuccessfully dangling lures I found a handful of first instar larvae on small Aspen saplings. I was sure they were Puss Moth, but had no camera and wasn't going to take a couple to rear knowing I'd be away for a while. So I had another look and very quickly found another handful on the same area of Aspen saplings (there are loads), now in what I think is early third instar. This seems very early, but would mean the eggs were laid in late April and over the last five years at least we've been seeing Puss Moth adults to light from c20th April, so a clear shift in phenology.

There were plenty of Cantharids knocking about too, though only Cantharis rustica got snapped ....

The garden trap last night was not so busy, but the diversity is still picking up.

Rustic Shoulder-knot - a particularly dark individual

Brown Rustic

Poplar Grey

Given the move in surgery date, I'll also be able to go and see The Wonder Stuff in June - but I'll still be missing the Isle of Wight Festival.

Leper

The title reflects the lepidopteran content, and the social distancing context! Today I headed out for what is now a bi-weekly big shop, and the experience was no better than last time. I have no idea what level of herd immunity we're at, but I can testify that we are at rampantly high levels of herd idiocy. People should be avoiding each other like they've visibly got something that you'd absolutley not want to have. Like Leprosy. I was in no rush, and took my time waiting for people to move. Many were similarly pleasant and considerate, many others were complete wankers.

I had the synergetic/actinic trap out last night, and it was as pants as I thought it would be. There was still one NFY species though, but not a nice colourful one.

Rustic Shoulder-knot

Later this afternoon I headed out for another walk down the disued railway line. It was damper underfoot after the rainy week, but not wet as such. The sun was in and out, but it was warm and a pleasant enough distaction. Again it was just about devoid of other people - one old lady departing when I arrived. I took a sweep net this time, potted a few bits and pointed the camera at a few others. I'll come back to the camera.

The hawthorn blossom was again my target, but beetle activity was still low with no big showy longhorns. More larvae showered down though, including one I've not seen before ....

Early Moth - not as sharp as I would like

Feathered Thorn

Green-brindled Crescent - head capsule about to pop off

.... plus lots of the same species as last weekend, like this Dotted Border/Scarce Umber

A few butterflies were active, though only settled when the sun went behind cloud ....

Red Admiral

Orange-tip

Speckled Wood

I mentioned last year that my Nikon P600 camera was starting to play up a bit and that I'd probably replace it. Lots of stuff got in the way after that, and I wasn't using it quite as much as I would have liked anyway. Today though the camera has driven me around the bend. The mode select wheel at the top is fine on some of the setting, but on others the camera keeps flipping between modes. Sometimes when viewing the images it refuses to zoom in to view, and then crashes back to shoot mode. And other times it just freezes and I have to disconnect the battery to get it back. Today it completely went for a wank and after refusing to turn on, eventually came beck to life having completely reset itself to factory settings. Otherwise I couldn't be happier with the camera - the image quality is fine (any really duff images are down to me rather than the camera), and I have had it a fair while now (5.5 years). But enough is enough, and I've ordered a replacement. Not quite a direct replacement, but near enough - the Nikon Coolpix P950. It will essentially be the same, except bigger and heavier with an even longer 83x optical zoom. It should arrive early next week, and no doubt I'll then have to work out what step-down ring I need to attach the raynox lenses.

50 Shades of Brown

Here's some fairly standard fare from the garden traps at this time of year - mainly brown apart from this one ....

Sycamore

Shuttle-shaped Dart - slightly oddly marked

Ingrailed Clay

Small Square-spot

Brown Rustic

Rustic Shoulder-knot

Agonopterix arenella

White-shouldered House Moth

Scalloped Hazel

From the garden trap, 13/05/2010 & Kermorgant

Despite the continued cold overnight conditions, after a slight increase in day time temps yesterday I got the traps out and hoped that at least something would come in. I was not surprised to find only few moths this morning, though on the positive half were firsts for the garden this year. Total catch was 9 of 8 sp. (125W MV 5 of 5, 80W actinic 4 of 4).

1906 Brimstone Moth (Opisthograptis luteolata) 1
1980 Eyed Hawk-moth (Smerinthus ocellata) 1 [first for year]
2078 Least Black Arches (Nola confusalis) 1
2092 Shuttle-shaped Dart (Agrotis puta) 1
2102 Flame Shoulder (Ochropleura plecta) 2 [first for year]
2160 Bright-line Brown-eye (Lacanobia oleracea) 1 [first for year]
2243 Early Grey (Xylocampa areola) 1
2334 Rustic Shoulder-knot (Apamea sordens) 1 [first for year]

I'm going to hang on to the Eyed Hawk. I still have the pupa from the caterpillar I found in the garden last year so I'll wait to see if that emerges and hopefully have a pair to breed - hawk larvae are always impressive and raising a few will keep the kids interested over the summer.

Flame Shoulder

Rustic Shoulder-knot

Eyed Hawk-moth - or at least the colourful bits, everything else was an out-of focus blur ....

Saturday night is National Moth Night 2010.

The date varies each year so that different key species can be targeted, and over time the whole of the main flight period for most species is covered. This is great in theory, but in practice running the event on a pre-determined date inevitably leads to the event coinciding with shite weather. The forecast for Saturday night is not much better than it has been all week, though the day time temps should creep up a little more again so I guess I'll be out somewhere.


Meanwhile, that penalty shoot out still hurts but this is just the tonic we needed:

From the garden trap - 27/05/2008

I hadn't seen the forecast, but when I got home from RW last night at 21:45 it was still not fully dark, mild and fairly still. After the week in Jordan, a weekend in Devon and foul pissy weather on Monday night, these were (relatively) excellent conditions to put out the garden traps again. Before I went to bed at just gone midnight, both traps were lively and the actinic in particular was buzzing with geometers. I decided to get up early to go through the traps at a leisurely pace. However, I was rudely awoken at 04:50 by torrential thundery rain - bugger! By the time I actually did the traps at 06:45 it had stopped raining but both traps had a good 2 - 3 inches of water sloshing about the egg boxes. Nevertheless, the catch was pretty good! As you would expect after a week of non-trapping in late May there were a few new species for the year.

Total catch 107 of 30sp.(125W MV 43 of 24sp., 80W actinic 64 of 23sp.)

First for the year:
Firethorn Leaf Miner (Phyllonorycter leucographella) 1
Epiblema cynosbatella 1
Common Marbled Carpet (Chloroclysta truncata) 5
Broken-barred Carpet (Electrophaes corylata) 1
Freyer's Pug (Eupithecia intricata arceuthata) 2
Lime Hawk-moth (Mimas tiliae) 1
Flame Shoulder (Ochropleura plecta) 2
Small Square-spot (Diarsia rubi) 1
Bright-line Brown-eye (Lacanobia oleracea) 1
Sycamore (Acronicta aceris) 1
Dark / Grey Dagger (Acronicta tridens/psi) 1
Rustic Shoulder-knot (Apamea sordens) 4
Highest counts:
Light Brown Apple Moth (Epiphyas postvittana) 15
Green Carpet (Colostygia pectinataria) 15
Garden Carpet (Xanthorhoe fluctuata) 12
Common Pug (Eupithecia vulgata) 9
Clouded Silver (Lomographa temerata) 7


Lime Hawk-moth


Scalloped Hazel


Rustic Shoulder-knot


The Sycamore