We have a couple of large bushes of spindle Euonymus europaeus in our garden (one is now quite substantial, over 12ft tall) which are well-used by moth larvae. The leaves provide food for the caterpillars of Ypsolopha mucronella (of which I've had three over-wintering adults to light already this year) and I get larval webs of Yponomeuta cagnagella annually, while the fruit are used by the caterpillars of the smart pyrale Nephopterix angustella. The adults of the latter species appear regularly in the moth trap in two generations between the second half of May and mid-September, with more than 70 records in the garden since 2006 when the first bush was planted. Last year angustella had a bumper season here with 30 individuals trapped. The earliest sighting for Westcott - which is also the earliest for Bucks as a whole - is 18th May (in 2020), so the surprise appearance of one to light here last night was nearly six weeks ahead of expectations locally - that's quite noteworthy! They over-winter as pupae and the books do say that they can start to appear from the end of April, but this one must somehow have been tempted to emerge very early indeed. That might be understood if we'd had an unexpected warm spell but the weather over the past month has been colder and damper than the average.
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| Nephopterix angustella, Westcott 6th April |
Dave Wilton Westcott, Bucks
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