Last night I caught what I thought initially might be Phaulernis fulviguttella. The yellow head and forward pointing antennae were very distinctive in life and the size seemed about right. Unfortunately it was a most uncooperative individual and I could not get it to settle long enough to get a photo. 20mins in the fridge or a couple of minutes in the freezer didn't help and then I managed to kill it with a longer spell in the freezer and the wings had to be prised apart to get a photo of the upper side which rather damaged the markings.
I am also not clear as to the current status of Phaulernis fulviguttella. The field guide describes it as common, UK moths as reasonably common but some of the County websites have it as Nationally Scarce B with few recent records.
I doubt whether the photos are good enough for identification but any suggestions would be welcome and I do still have the moth if it would be worth examining further.
Andy Newbold, Sibford Ferris, Oxon.
Hi Andy,
ReplyDeleteTo me it looks like you have one of the Monopis species - either weaverella or laevigella but could be wrong. Best wishes, Marc
Thank you. That looks right. I was looking at illustrations of moths that held their antennae pointing forward like the Plutellidae and therefore overlooked the Monopsis species.
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