Further new emergences

With a deterioration in the weather expected, last night looked like it would the be the final opportunity for some "away trapping" for a couple of weeks so I opted to go back to Bernwood Forest.  With the ever earlier species emergences of late, I was hoping that perhaps the first Scarce Prominents might have appeared, a species I haven't seen there for a couple of years.  My earliest ever date in Bernwood is 7th April (2017) when ten were recorded, so I didn't think 28th March was all that unreasonable, but of the moth there was unfortunately no sign.  I will have to make the effort again because this is an uncommon species and, unlike most of the other Prominents, it doesn't come back with a second brood.

The catch last night, shared between two MV traps over three hours, was again dominated by Small Quaker with 972 of them counted, while Common Quaker (96), Oak Beauty (51) & Red Chestnut (42) were next in line.  The overall species tally came to 32 and, unsurprisingly, was very similar in content to last week's effort, although new emergences included the four moths shown below:

Frosted Green, Bernwood 28th March

Water Carpet, Bernwood 28th March

Brimstone Moth, Bernwood 28th March

Lunar Marbled Brown, Bernwood 28th March

The Frosted Green count came to 16 but the other three shown here all came in as singletons, the Lunar Marbled Brown having already become rather battered.

Dave Wilton Westcott, Bucks