I have had the biggest invasion of moths in all my 16 years of light trapping - hundreds of ermine micros all over the trap itself and around. The mere sight of them tired me too much to attempt much in the way of ID, especially given my record of blunders. But here are some pics. More cheeringly, from my point of view, the Kent Black Arches has arrived here, to be welcomed by a particular favourite of mine, the Tree-lichen Beauty. Martin Wainwright, Thrupp, Oxon
Hello Martin,
ReplyDeleteI've had loads of these Ermine moths too. The night of the 23rd seemed to be the peak, to date anyway, when I counted 199 to the two garden traps (may have missed a few!). The vast majority went down as "Yponomeuta species" although a few were confirmed as either evonymella or rorrella. We have two spindle bushes in the garden, one of them quite substantial (in excess of 15ft in height), both of which were covered in larval webbing of Y.cagnagella and completely stripped of their leaves, although both have since recovered completely. Our apple has had more larvae of Y.malinellus on it than usual too, but in much smaller groups and they've been nowhere near as devastating to the host as those on spindle. Our garden blackthorn has been spared but there's a huge amount of it in the local area and I have seen the occasional web on it so I assume Y.padella is also having a good season. Strange how this little group of species have all prospered when everything else seems to be struggling this year!
How interesting, Dave. We have several very big willows near us but I've not come across any webs, nor on the copious amounts of blackthorn. I've never been quite sure what Spindle is but I will go hunting, armed with my iPhone's plant identifier. My son's iPhone does 'bugs' too, so maybe my long-lasting confusions about moths will one day have an easier solution. But meanwhile I keep trying. My granddaughter's trap, which you so kindly recommended, keeps producing wonders in Wiltshire, most notably recently a Rosy Footman, the first I'd seen. All warmest, M
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