Worn specimen

 Hi there,

Can anyone make anything of this worn micro? Two shots of the same insect.

Thanks, David

Light Orange Underwing

I finally caught up with Light Orange Underwing on Monday this week at Ham Home Wood.  

There were several flying high in the tops of the mature Aspen.  I took several photos, not expecting to get anything at all.  

I finally had time to have a look at the photos this evening and although they are not going to win any prizes, I am pleased to get a couple of record shots!

Neil Fletcher
Walter's Ash (VC24)

Lashford Lane Fen, 28/03/22

I ran an LED trap at Lashford Lane Fen last night with some decent variety. Lead-coloured Drab was nice to get, and I always enjoy seeing the first Purple Thorn of the year!

Full summary below.

Oak Beauty

Water Carpet

Purple Thorn

Lead-coloured Drab

Date: 28/03/2022

Site: Lashford Lane Fen (SP4601), Berkshire (VC22)

Method: 1x 3W LED (440-460nm), 2x 3W LED (365-370nm). Homemade Heath trap.

Individuals: 41

Species: 16

29.0010 - (Diurnea fagella) 4

32.0190 - (Agonopterix heracliana/ciliella) 1

70.1030 Water Carpet (Lampropteryx suffumata) 2

70.2020 Early Tooth-striped (Trichopteryx carpinata) 3

70.2390 Purple Thorn (Selenia tetralunaria) 1

70.2450 March Moth (Alsophila aescularia) 4

70.2480 Brindled Beauty (Lycia hirtaria) 1

70.2510 Oak Beauty (Biston strataria) 1

73.0320 Nut-tree Tussock (Colocasia coryli) 1

73.1940 The Chestnut (Conistra vaccinii) 2

73.2010 Pale Pinion (Lithophane socia) 1

73.2420 Clouded Drab (Orthosia incerta) 5

73.2440 Common Quaker (Orthosia cerasi) 5

73.2450 Small Quaker (Orthosia cruda) 7

73.2460 Lead-coloured Drab (Orthosia populeti) 1

73.2490 Hebrew Character (Orthosia gothica) 2

Westcott, Bucks

The chances are that I won't be adding many more species to the garden list before the end of the month, but the current total (58) has already equalled last year's achievement and is at the high end of what can be expected here during the first quarter of the year thanks to the good weather of the last week or two.  The last few additions have comprised Early Tooth-striped, Double-striped Pug, Brindled Beauty & Tawny Pinion (all 26th) and Mompha epilobiella, Alucita hexadactyla, Chinese Character & Red Chestnut (all 28th).

Alucita hexadactyla, Westcott 28th March

Chinese Character, Westcott 28th March

Tawny Pinion, Westcott 26th March

The Alucita hexadactyla above is not in its usual resting pose which might cause identification problems for some!  The Chinese Character is the earliest I've ever seen the species by just under two weeks and in fact two turned up last night, one to the actinic trap and the other to the front door light.  The very welcome Tawny Pinion is the first spring record in the garden since 2010, the few sightings I get here being mostly in the autumn.

Dave Wilton Westcott, Bucks

ID’s please

 This is my first post, and I’m looking for confirmation of two tentative ID’s of moths caught in my Robinson trap in Wheatley this morning.  The first I’ve marked, very tentatively, as Lead-coloured Drab (?) and the second as Red Chestnut. Comments welcomed.

Richard Harding, Wheatley

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      

White-marked

Trapped in West Oxon woodland last night. Just checking ID as White-marked ... ?

 

Epermenia chaerophyllella, Agonopterix alstromeriana and Oak Nycteoline.

First time I've been able to run the trap for over a week, and now the garden sallow has largely gone over and cold weather is forecast, may be a week or so before it is worth trapping again.

I had 12 species last night, mostly the usual suspects, but a few interesting ones.

Epermenia chaerophyllella, a new species for the garden, had me confused for a while.  The large brown scale tufts are characteristic.

 Agonopterix alstromeriana, as well as one in the trap, I had one in my allotment polytunnel yesterday which is in a different 2km square.

Finally, Oak Nycteoline (Nycteola revayana), a local species which I get regulatly in the  garden.

Neil Fletcher
Walter's Ash (VC24)

Early things

This Mullein near the garden trap this morning is early, as was Dave's Brindled Beauty in Bernwood, but I had an even earlier one here on 15th. Emperors are out early as well.

In contrast, not long ago I verified a record of a female at light on 2 Jun last year. All these species show only a very small % of records in March in the Atlas. There's no doubt this is an early year so far. 

Still looking . . . .

. . . .for my first Lead-coloured Drab. Of these two possibles - I'm thinking the first is  Clouded, but the second one . . . . .??? 

What do you think?

David

Humming-bird Hawk-moth

I've just seen a Humming-bird Hawk-moth in our garden (Loosley Row, Bucks), by far the earliest record of it here.

Nigel

Upper Thames Moth Atlas

We're very pleased to announce that the Atlas is now "live" and available to view at the link here.  Our grateful thanks go to Jim Wheeler for all the work involved in setting up the site, to BC Upper Thames Branch for funding the initial costs, to Les Evans-Hill of the NMRS at BC for cleaning up the data and, of course, to all our local recorders past and present who have provided the underlying records which generate the maps.     

This is still very much a work in progress, covering macro-moths only until the micro data has been tidied-up, but the basics of the site are now in place so we thought it was time to go public.  What we would like to happen now is for you to sign up to the "Golden Cinnabar" membership (suggested donation of around £10, or more if you are feeling generous!) which will give you access to the detailed county maps and record data down to the 1km square level.  The funds generated will hopefully cover the annual running costs of the website.

We also need more photos.  There are about 40 species which at present don't have an image to accompany the species account and these are a particular priority.  We would also like to add to (and in a few cases replace) the images already present.  While we don't want to be inundated with Brimstone pictures, if you do have good, clear photos of any of the described species which you think adds to what is already available, perhaps by showing different views or variation in markings, please upload them for consideration.  When going through the process you'll see that there is a box for "Brief Comments" where we'd like you to add where/when the image was taken.  The pictures go into a waiting room to be checked by one of the Admins and those selected will appear on the site with due credit.  While we'd particularly like images taken in our three counties, we recognize that this isn't always possible and will in fact welcome pictures from absolutely anywhere so long as they're good enough.  Contributions are very welcome from anyone who uses the site, whether an Upper Thames recorder or not.  Please keep to macro-moth photos for now and we'll let you know when we want to start thinking about the micros.

Martin Harvey (CMR for VC22 Berkshire) 

Martin Townsend (CMR for VC23 Oxfordshire)

Martin Albertini (CMR for VC24 Buckinghamshire)

Dave Wilton    

     

Another White-marked

Paul Watts in Prestwood, Bucks had this smart White-marked to his garden trap on Friday night.  This is mainly a woodland species.  Although found fairly widely across our area, there are generally only a handful of records each year so it is always good to see. 

White-marked, Prestwood 25th March

Flying Tonight

 I’m not sure who to thank for adding one of my iRecord photos to “Flying Tonight” on  the Butterfly Conservation Upper Thames Branch website. I only discovered this really helpful resource a few weeks ago.

Janice Robertson 

Milton Keynes 

Nut-tree Tussock

 A fairly early Nut-tree Tussock put in an appearance here last night.

Andy Newbold, Sibford Ferris, Oxon.

ID Confirmations please - Powdered Quaker + Ypsolopha mucronella

 I usually tend to jump the gun on Powdered Quakers - I only get one a year if I'm lucky and Common Quakers are so variable, however this one seems to fit the bill with the row of black dots, chalky appearance and indistinct oval marks.

The other confirmation I'm looking for is for Ypsolopha mucronella. It was on the front door - I generally don't see anything there as we changed our porch light to LED many years ago. The streak isn't very clear but I think it's the only one out at this time of year?

Mark Griffiths, Garsington, Oxford.

Mompha subbistrigella or sturnipennella?

 Both would be new to me, and the scale shows that it's about 5mm long. This is my only photo - couldn't get the side view. Am I even on the right track?? It came to light last night.

Best wishes, David

New moths for year

 Three welcome new moths for the year, last night: Shoulder-stripe, Yellow Horned and Blossom Underwing, possibly my favourite Orthosia.

Westcott, Bucks

A couple more micros were added to the 2022 garden list here on 22nd March, comprising Caloptilia populetorum and Epermenia chaerophyllella.  The latter is a regular here but the Caloptilia was completely new for the site (my third new garden species already this year!).  Despite the name its larvae actually feed on birches of which we have several here.

Caloptilia populetorum, Westcott 22nd March

Epermenia chaerophyllella, Westcott 22nd March

The only other addition has been this smart Streamer which turned up last night (25th), taking the garden list past 50 species which is about average for this point in the year.

Streamer, Westcott 25th March

Dave Wilton Westcott, Bucks

Getting in on the act

I put out my mercury light on my Robinson trap last night in my Wolvercote, Oxfordshire, garden, along with a smaller portable actinic trap, without much expectation of anything: just wanting to get my mothing year off to some sort of start. I'm glad I did, as my second ever Emperor Moth (and my first in the current garden) graced the Robinson trap; along with, in the actinic trap, the other moth pictured (one photo with flash, the other without) which, judging by other posts here, I suspect may have been a Lead-coloured Drab (my initial assumption was a rather poorly-marked Twin-spotted Quaker, but I think it was too small, and the markings aren't right). I'd be grateful for confirmation; if it is a Lead-coloured, I think it's my first.

Emperor Moth, 24/3/22

Possible Lead-coloured Drab, 24/3/22

Possible Lead-coloured Drab, 24/3/22

Steve Goddard

Herald

I was very pleased to find this Herald in the garden actinic trap from last night. The last time I recorded a Herald was back in 2017.

Steve Trigg, Cookham

More woodland trapping

On Tuesday night I took two MV traps to Finemere Wood for the usual three hours from dusk and got 767 moths of 23 species with nothing unexpected.  493 Small Quakers were counted so they're still going strong.  Last night it was the turn of Bernwood Forest, again with two traps, and there the Small Quaker total exceeded four digits with 1,023 counted.  30 species turned up, including signs of new emergences with Early Tooth-striped (1), Purple Thorn (1), Brindled Beauty (1) & Nut-tree Tussock (4) putting in welcome appearances.  The Purple Thorn and Brindled Beauty were my earliest ever records.

Early Tooth-striped, Bernwood Forest 23rd March

Purple Thorn, Bernwood Forest 23rd March

Brindled Beauty, Bernwood Forest 23rd March

Dave Wilton Westcott, Bucks

Acleris sp.

I caught the two below last night, so presumably they are both the same species. The paler one looks rather like A. schalleriana, though that seems pretty unlikely as we are not on chalk here, but on clay, so I guess it is more likely to be a variant of A. ferrugana/notana. 

I have retained the paler one if needed for dissection.

Acleris kochiella?

 This one is new to me, so I'm just looking for confirmation that it is A kochiella.

Many thanks

David

Radnage, Bucks

Ched George's trap at Radnage produced a White-marked last night, his 17th garden record although the first since 2015.  The rest of the catch comprised Diurnea fagella (1), Early Thorn (2), Oak Beauty (1), Dotted Border (2), Small Quaker (87), Common Quaker (49), Clouded Drab (11), Twin-spotted Quaker (9), Hebrew Character (63), Satellite (1), Chestnut (3) & Early Grey (6).

White-marked, Radnage 22nd March

Luring

Following Dave's advice I have been putting the FUN lure out in the garden for the past few days and finally hit the jackpot!

I also ran the EMP lure in local woodland this afternoon at  4:00 pm and got a response within ten minutes.

I then moved to Foxcote to see whether there were any Little Gulls there, which there were, but as I watched an Emperor Moth flew in and through the hide, so obviously I had a trace of pheromone on my clothing, but it must only have been a trace. What an impressive sense of smell!

And another Lead-coloured!

Finally caught up with what I assume is Lead-coloured Drab in my Stoke Goldington garden. This moth preferred the actinic front door light to the MV trap! A better marked example than Phil's, significantly smaller than the Clouded specimens.

As an aside, if running two traps with different light sources on the same night, when entering records into iRecord, is it best to fill out two separate moth group forms, one for each source? Also, do you know if anything is actually done with the data corresponding the moths attracted to different kinds of light sources?