Some Reedy Good Moths!

Bit late this week, being Sunday, and not the usual Friday, but I've only just uploaded my photos to laptop.

So yeah, started the week by a trap session at Broadmayne, at a friends place, which managed to produce about 350 moths of 86 species, with 3new species for me: Scorched Carpet (2), Maple Pug (2), Ptocheuusa paupella (I have no idea whatsoever on how to pronounce that!). Also, good numbers of Four-spotted Footman, and my first females of the species, and the usual species which I don't get at home often (Black Arches, Oak Hook-tip ect)

Scorched Carpet - New for me, quite a nice moth too!

Female Four-spotted Footman - Nationally Scarce A (defo breeding here, whereas a migrant back home)

So yeah, continuous trapping in the garden (not every night though) produced some nice species this week, with 9 species being new for garden, which the highlights were Old Lady (which I first saw only a week or two ago), Black Arches, Crescent, and Scrobipalpa suaedella (a Nationally Scarce micro).

The Old Lady - rarely attracted to light, and one I've been after for a while now.

 

The week ended with a moth event at Radipole Lake with the Dorset Moth Group. With 8 traps (5 MVs and 3 Actinics) running till about midnight, we managed to get 109 species, with 10 species new for me. The highlights were the Wainscots for some, with Webb's, Southern, Brown-veined, Twin-spotted, Smoky, Common, Bulrush and Small Wainscots all being present. Being my first proper trapping session on reeds, Brown-veined, Twin-spotted and Bulrush were all new to me, but someone else took the only Bulrush to photograph (I'm fine with this though, I live local to Radipole Lake and can trap there, and will probably get a Bulrush wonder into the garden at some point), and while Brown-veined were more common than Twin-spotted, apparently I only took 2 TS to photograph (and a very, very dark Brown-veined).

Twin-spotted Wainscot  - Named for the two white spots on the wing (surprise surprise!)

There were some nice macros which I have seen before, albeit infrequently, with Gold Spot, Oblique Carpet, Narrow-winged Pug and many Drinkers being nice ones for me. Have a pic of a female Drinker

Female Drinker - a big moth that laid some eggs on ye old moth trap.

Some nice micros too, with Limnaecia phragmitella and Calamotropha paludella being new reedbed micros, and Epermenia falciformis and Prochoreutis myllerana being of note (all new to me). Also a Scrobipalpa suaedella (another of the nationally scarce micros, a different individual to the last (mine was still in pot)).

Limnaecia phragmitella - pretty much the only non-colourful member of the Cosmopterix family. Much bigger than I'd expected.

Calamotropha paludella - A reedbed crambid, one of the micros I've been hoping to see.