To Moth, or Not To Moth? - That Is The Question!

The Black to Green Project, for which the main remit is to return local disused coal workings into havens for wildlife (see here:- www.blacktogreen.org.uk/), were hosting a moth event on Friday 8th June at Moira, which is just down the road from us. Lindsay and I were lucky enough to get a place on this event. The arrangements were that we would attend a talk and demonstration on the Friday evening, and would then be issued with a moth trap to set up in our gardens. We would then return on the Saturday morning for a 'breakfast' and examine the contents of our respective traps.

I had to think long and hard before booking to attend this event. I'd been resisting getting involved with moths for some time as I was sure that there was every chance that I'd get hooked. However, I felt that this event would give me the chance to 'try moth-ing on for size' without a financial outlay and commitment.

We were very lucky that the event was not cancelled as Adrian Russell (the County Moth Recorder) who had been engaged to present the event had done some serious damage to his leg prior to the event and was in great pain. He did, however, give us a splendid presentation which was extremely interesting and entertaining.

I was somewhat surprised when, at the end, those of us that were resident in 'The Heart of the National Forest' (as we are) were issued with brand new moth traps, expertly manufactured by Adrian to a great, and economic, design!

That night, the weather was fine, the trap was set up in our garden, and we eagerly awaited the next morning.

The Russell Moth Trap

The following day we were up early and blocked off the entrance to the trap. We could see we'd got a few moths, but did not know what. Assembling in Moira at 08h30 Lindsay and I were far too excited to think about breakfast. Adrian took us to tables outside and went through the seven traps one-by-one, identifying and recording each species as he delved inside. We all got a chance to look at everyone else's catch. Our turn came near the end of this process. and I managed to photograph some of our moths. To the best of my knowledge, no one had caught anything rare, but there were some beautiful moths.

Adrian was recording the finds on a small voice recorder and promised to email us all with the results.

The biggest surprise was yet to come! Adrian then told us that we were free to borrow the traps until the end of the season!!! But this was not all we got - he also presented each of us with a brand new copy of the Waring and Townsend field guide (he'd managed to get copies of the earlier 2009 edition, signed by Richard Lewington - the illustrator - at an advantageous price!) and these too were ours to borrow until the end of the season!

Please note: It is conventional to record the date of catches in traps as being the date that the trap was deployed.

Friday 8th June, 2018

Our trap, in a suburban garden, had the lowest species count (13) of the 7 traps. I suspect that most of the other traps were in a more rural location. We did, however, rank 4th in 'numbers caught' (31). The highest in terms of numbers and species was from a trap in Oakthorpe (73/26).

Here are a few from our trap:-

Snout (Hypena proboscidalis) - on 8th June

(Cochylis atricapitana) - on 8th June

Middle-barred Minor (Oligia fasciuncula) - on 8th June

Small Clouded Brindle (Apamea unanimis) - on 8th June

Buff Ermine (Spilosoma luteum) - on 8th June

Garden Grass-veneer (Chrysoteuchia culmella) - on 8th June

Saturday 9th June, 2018

The following night, the trap went out again. I didn't mention, above, that part of the kit that Adrian had supplied us with was a selection of eight specimen pots. My plan was to try and get the moths into the pots (I had an extra 30 pots of my own to add to the 8), then put them in the fridge for a couple of hours to slow them down, and then take them out one-by-one to photograph them. 

We had a reasonable haul of moths, but I managed to lose quite a few, unidentified, before I could get them into the pots and lost a fair few more (notably the smaller ones) before I could photograph them, when I extracted them from the pots.

In these early days, by far the most numerous species I was catching was Heart and Dart. We have also been getting two forms of Riband Wave. That day I managed to record 19 moths of 13 species. Here are some of them.

Heart and Dart (Agrotis exclamationis) - on 9th June

Timothy Tortrix (Aphelia paleana) - on 9th June

Marbled Minor agg. (Oligia strigilis agg.) - on 9th June

Double Square-spot (Xestia triangulum) - on 9th June

Riband Wave (Idaea aversata) - on 9th June

Ingrailed Clay (Diarsia mendica mendica) - on 9th June

Peppered Moth (Biston betularia) - on 9th June

Not everything caught in the traps has been a moth. We get a few other things, with plenty of mayflies, and the occasional Sexton Beetle (complete with mites) - we have even had a Water Boatman!

Black Sexton Beetle (Nicrophorus humatore) - on 9th June

Saturday 16th June, 2018

The next deployment of the trap was a week later. I'd spent well over a full day sorting out the catch from the previous week so had decided that once a week was just about acceptable.

I'd come to the conclusion that using flash for my moth photography was, perhaps, not the way to go as I was getting 'flattening' of detail. I'd also decided that it would help if I had a measuring scale alongside the specimens when I photographed them. In the event, the results were less pleasing and I reverted to the use of flash, and abandoned the scale, at the beginning of July!

This time I managed to record 28 moths of 16 different species. I'd also become resigned, by now, to losing, maybe, 30% of the catch before identifying them. The first image, shot through the specimen tube (it escaped as I tried to extract it) was initially identified by a moth authority as being Toadflax Pug (an extreme rarity in the county), but subsequently identified by the County Recorder as being Foxglove Pug (common).

Foxglove Pug (Eupithecia exiguata exiguata) - on 16th June

Small Magpie (Eurrhypara hortilata) - on 16th June

Green Pug (Pasiphila rectangulata) - on 16th June

Anania coronata - on 16th June

Ancylis achetana - on 16th June

Beautiful Golden Y (Autographa pulchrina) - on 16th June

Sunday 24th June, 2018

This night, I only managed to record 27 moths of 11 species. Here are a few of them - they included the delightfully named 'Uncertain' (a common visitor to our garden) and possibly my favourite catch so far, the Buff-tip :-

Uncertain (Hoplodrina alsines) - on 24th June

Mottled Beauty (Alcis repandata repandata) - on 24th June

Buff-tip (Phalera bucephala) - on 24th June

Monday 2nd July, 2018

This deployment resulted in the identification of 33 moths 17 species. I'd reverted to the use of flash on the camera, although it is something I'm not practised at. The absolute highlight for me was trapping an Elephant Hawkmoth - a quite common moth, but absolutely beautiful, even if it was a bit tatty! The Riband Wave, shown below, is of forma remutata - we get far more of these than the nominate.

Common Wainscot (Mythimna pallens) - on 2nd July

Willow Beauty (Peribatodes rhomboidria) - on 2nd July

Riband Wave (Idaea aversata f. remutata) - on 2nd July

Elephant Hawkmoth (Deilephila elpenor) - on 2nd July

Monday 9th July, 2018

We did a little better this day, with 46 moths of 21 species being recorded. It was also noticeable that the mix of species was changing. We had our first of several Scalloped Oak, and I'm rather fond of the colour-form of the Large Yellow Underwing we had that day. The Ermine species is one that is, I understand, virtually impossible to fully identify without dissection!

Shuttle-shaped Dart (Agrotis puta insula) - on 9th July

Double-striped Pug (Gymnoscelis rufifasciata) - on 9th July

Scalloped Oak (Crocallis elinguaria) - on 9th July

Large Yellow Underwing (Noctua pronuba) - on 9th July

Ermine sp. (Yponomeutidae sp.) - on 9th July

Dark Arches (Apamea monoglypha) - on 9th July

Marbled Beauty (Cryphia domestica) - on 9th July

Sunday 15th July, 2018

I managed to record 51 moths of 28 species from this session, so our best to date. The star of this session was the Purple Thorn, although it went before I could take any pleasing shots.

Wax Moth (Galleria mellonella) - on 15th July

Scarce Footman (Eilema complana) - on 15th July

Yellow-tail (Euproctis similis) - on 15th July

Silver Y (Autographa gamma) - on 15th July

Flame Shoulder (Ochropleura flammatra) - on 15th July

Clouded Border (Lomaspilis marginata) - on 15th July

Pale Prominent (Pterostoma palpina) - on 15th July

Brimstone Moth (Opisthograptis luteolata) - on 15th July

Purple Thorn (Selenia tetralunaria) - on 15th July

Conclusion

On the question posed in the title to this blog post, the answer is that the jury is still out on this one. I am finding the subject of moths rather fascinating, but extremely time-consuming. The matter of extracting the moths from the trap is typically taking less than an hour. However, the photography is probably taking up to a couple of hours, processing the photos is 2 or 3 hours. Identifying the moths and logging them is, however, taking a huge amount of time.

I need to reduce the time spent on moths as it is detrimental to my other interests. It's not been too bad for the last couple of weeks as I have been unwell and unable to go out, and the moths have kept me occupied. I'm sure that the time spent on photography, photo processing, and identification will reduce significantly as I get more familiar with the subject. I will also possibly be more selective about what species I photograph and record - micromoths are very difficult!

I currently intend to put the trap out again on Tuesday night (24th July). 

I expect that there could be a few errors in my IDs above - if you notice any, please let me know.

My thanks to Adrian Russell for a brilliant introduction to the subject, and the extremely generous loan of a 'complete kit'. I hope that the leg is better soon and out of plaster, Adrian, and that you become fully functional again. My records will be on their way to you when you are able to deal with them.

My thanks, also, to the unknown person who is behind @MothIDUK. Your assistance in the identification of numerous moths has been very much appreciated. I hope that, as I gain experience, my calls on your help will diminish!

To my reader(s) out there, my apologies for this not being a short post as intimated at the end of my previous post - I suspect that any future posts on the subject of moths will be reserved for 'interesting finds' - thank you for dropping by!

I'm expecting my next post to largely feature butterflies and dragons seen on a visit to Norfolk - and good is was too!