Welcome

Hello and welcome to my moth Blog. I now reside in a small village in East Cambridgeshire called Fordham. My Blog's aim is to promote and encourage others to participate in the wonderful hobby that is Moth-trapping.
Moth records are vital for building a picture of our ecosystem around us, as they really are the bottom of the food chain. They are an excellent early indicator of how healthy a habitat is. I openly encourage people to share their findings via social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter & Instagram.
So why do we do it? well for some people it is to get an insight into the world of Moths, for others it is to build a list of species much like 'Twitching' in the Bird world. The reason I do it....you just never know what you might find when you open up that trap! I hope to show what different species inhabit Cambridgeshire and neighbouring counties.
On this Blog you will find up-to-date records and pictures.
I run a trap regularly in my garden and also enjoy doing field trips to various localities over several different counties.
Please also check out the links in the sidebar to the right for other people's Blogs and informative Websites.
Thanks for looking and happy Mothing!

KEY

NFY = New Species For The Year
NFG = New Species For The Garden
NEW! = New Species For My Records

Any Species highlighted in RED signifies a totally new species for my records.

If you have any questions or enquiries then please feel free to email me
Contact Email : bensale@rocketmail.com

My Latest Notables and Rarities

Thursday 9 June 2016

Moth Trapping down on the farm part 2



I decided to run some more lights on my parents farm again on Tuesday night.

This was the second time this year that I decided to go all out with five traps scattered around the 10 acres of farmland.
The weather was very questionable indeed and we had had some rain earlier with flashes of lightning and rumbles of thunder thrown into the mix as well.
It was the temperature that spurred me on more than anything, hitting a heady 24 degrees during late afternoon and with predicted overnight minimum temperatures of around 14 degrees!

The traps were positioned underneath as much cover as possible to avoid being drenched through, two of the traps I placed under the old grain silos and another one went under the awning of a former stable block.
The other two braved the elements out in the open.

After I had setup it started to drizzle again and this theme continued through the night, eventually fizzling out by 12.30am.
By 4am however it seemed to have only just started to rain again which was a real pain sorting through the catches as moths seem to be hyper-sensitive to rain droplets landing on them when they are settled on the egg trays.
Thankfully the rain stopped in time for photographing them and we were soon greeted by a warm sunny day again.
There were plenty of moths coming to all of the lights but quite a few examples of the same species.

I was pleasantly surprised however when I nearly o so nearly hit 100 species...99 it was to be!

Best moths were examples of Lobster Moth, Sandy Carpet, Aethes tesserana, Anania perlucidalis and White-point.

Catch Report - 06/06/16 - Back Garden - Stevenage - 2x 125w MV Robinson Trap 1x 160w MBT Robinson Trap 1x 80w Actinic Suitcase Trap & 1x 40w Actinic and 26w BLB Trap

Macro Moths - 60 Species

2x Angle Shades
1x Brimstone Moth
1x Buff Ermine
5x Cinnabar
3x Clouded Silver
1x Clouded-bordered Brindle
2x Common Carpet
4x Common Pug
21x Common Swift
1x Common Wainscot
1x Coxcomb Prominent
1x Elephant Hawk-moth
3x Flame
7x Flame Shoulder
2x Garden Carpet
1x Ghost Moth
3x Green Carpet
2x Green Silver-lines
1x Grey-pine Carpet
5x Grey Pug
9x Heart & Dart
1x Iron Prominent
7x Large Nutmeg
2x Large Yellow Underwing
3x Light Emerald
1x Lime-speck Pug
1x Lobster Moth
17x Marbled Minor
5x Middle-barred Minor
2x Mottled Pug
2x Mottled Rustic
2x Orange Footman
3x Pale Oak Beauty
2x Pale Tussock
1x Peppered Moth
3x Poplar Hawk-moth
1x Purple Bar
20x Rustic Shoulder-knot
1x Sandy Carpet
1x Scorched Carpet
5x Scorched Wing
35x Setaceous Hebrew Character
2x Shears
1x Shoulder-striped Wainscot
3x Silver-Y
5x Silver-ground Carpet
4x Small Square-spot
2x Snout
2x Spectacle
2x Straw Dot
1x Swallow Prominent
3x Tawny Marbled Minor
16x Treble Lines
1x Uncertain
1x Vine's Rustic
1x Waved Umber
7x White Ermine
1x White-point
1x White-spotted Pug
2x Willow Beauty

Micro Moths - 39 Species

3x Epiblema cirsiana/stictiana
10x Anthophila fabriciana
300+ Plutella xylostella
1x Cauchas rufimitrella
8x Celypha lacunana
10x Crambus lathoniellus
2x Endrosis sarcitrella
3x Mompha subbistrigella
3x Glyphipterix simpliciella
5x Chrysoteuchia culmella
2x Aethes tesserana
4x Scoparia ambigualis
4x Aphomia sociella
1x Eucosma hohenwartiana
2x Hofmannophila pseudospretella
2x Agapeta hamana
1x Aphelia paleana
1x Paraswammerdamia albicapitella
3x Udea olivalis
2x Monopis weaverella
1x Blastobasis lacticolella
2x Epinotia bilunana
10x Pseudargyrotoza conwagana
3x Hedya pruniana
1x Eudonia pallida
3x Cochylis atricapitana
2x Homoeosoma sinuella
1x Prays fraxinella/ruficeps
2x Notocelia cynosbatella
2x Hedya nubiferana
1x Anania perlucidalis
1x Tinea semifulvella
1x Eudonia lacustrata
1x Eudonia mercurella
2x Argyresthia spinosella
1x Notocelia uddmanniana
1x Epiblema costipunctana
1x Achroia grisella
1x Metzneria metzneriella

The habitat









White-point













Green Silver-lines













Lobster Moth












Anania perlucidalis












Aphelia paleana











Epinotia bilunana











Eucosma hohenwartiana


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