Nick Bowles (BC) and Neil Fletcher (Bucks Invertebrate Group) led a very successful event for National Moth Night at BBOWT's flagship College Lake reserve in Bucks this morning which involved opening a number of moth traps in front of interested members of the public. Five of us (Neil, Martin Albertini, Rob Payne, Gordon Redford and myself) left traps running at the site overnight on Friday and the combined result was well over 150 species and will be closer to 200 by the time pots have been inspected. There were plenty of "crowd-pleasers", including a good selection of Hawk-moths (Privet, Lime, Eyed & Poplar, plus lots of Elephant & Small Elephant) and plenty of colourful and cryptic moths such as Buff Arches, Peach Blossom, Small Emerald, Barred Yellow, Pretty Chalk Carpet, Buff-tip, Bordered Sallow & Burnished Brass. The Hawk-moths in particular provided no end of photo opportunities on an adjacent tree-trunk, that's when they weren't being man-handled by small children. Good job they are so accommodating!
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| Pretty Chalk Carpet, College Lake |
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| Bordered Sallow, College Lake |
From my own point of view some of the "boring brown jobs" were just as interesting! Wetland species included
Clepsis spectrana,
Calamotropha paludella (including a couple of the white form sporting black spots which are a feature of the colony here),
Donacaula forficella,
Schoenobius gigantella, most of the China-marks, Obscure Wainscot (15 of them in my own trap down in the reeds and it was present in most of the others too), Silky Wainscot & Dotted Fan-foot. Amongst the others were a number of Elachistas which will require closer attention but one that could be identified straight away was the smart
Elachista subocellea. All in all a very worthwhile event with some interesting and useful records.
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| Elachista subocellea, College Lake |
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| Obscure Wainscot, College Lake |
Dave Wilton
Westcott, Bucks
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