Field Trip - Ashwell Quarry - 09/04/17

I made a trip back to Ashwell Quarry following the warmest weekend of the year so far with highs of 23 degrees on Sunday, Saturday wasn't bad either at around 20 degrees.

Sunday night was planned and I arrived at the reserve in good time to try and find some Rock-rose as a scarce Mompha species uses it as it's foodplant. 

Unfortunately there was none to be found anywhere and I came to the conclusion that I surely couldn't have been over-looking it (Later on Chris confirmed to me that there wasn't any here afterall).

All was not lost as I was there to light trap all evening until it was too cold.

I went about setting up 4 traps spread out across the reserve, some in the grass fields and one on the edge of the chalk pit, the wind wasn't too bad but it was there and coming from the West so I decided to site the traps out of the wind as best as I could do...this paid off as by 10pm the wind was very gusty and cooler as well.

The temperature was 21 degrees at 7pm and dropped to 11c at midnight at leaving time.

The moths were varied and pretty fantastic to say the least with good amounts of late spring/early summer species turning up.

Most numerous were Common Quaker (15), Double-striped Pug (12)  and Agonopterix alstromeriana (8).

Early species on the wing included Yellow-barred Brindle, Least Black Arches and Small Waved Umber.

Now I wasn't expecting to see anything too exciting given how early on in the season it is, but my luck was in and I got to see species such as Semioscopsis steinkellneriana, Depressaria chaerophylli and Agonopterix purpurea, moths that I don't see very often with just a few records to each of these species.

Even better I recorded two moths completely new to me, Depressaria radiella (the Parsnip Moth, yes it really is scarce in Hertfordshire with no more than 10 records since records began!) and the best moth of the night and 3rd County record Phaneta pauperana, a Dog-rose feeding chalk speciality Tortrix moth confined to the South.

Thanks again go to Chris and Trevor for allowing me to come back here again. 

Catch Report - 09/04/17 - Ashwell Quarry - North-west Herts - 2x 125w MV Robinson Trap 1x 160w MBT Robinson Trap & 1x 40w Actinic Trap - Warm, clear then cloudy with a full moon, stiffening Westerly breeze by 10pm - minimum of 11c

27 species

Macro Moths

1x Brindled Pug

1x Common Carpet

15x Common Quaker

12x Double-striped Pug

1x Early Thorn

6x Hebrew Character

1x Knot Grass

1x Least Black Arches

1x March Moth

6x Nut-tree Tussock

1x Purple Thorn

3x Red Chestnut

1x Red-green Carpet

5x Red Twin-spot Carpet 

1x Small Waved Umber

9x Streamer 

3x V-Pug

5x Yellow-barred Brindle

 

Micro Moths

1x Depressaria radiella [NEW!] 

1x Phaneta pauperana [NEW!]

1x Acleris cristana

8x Agonopterix alstromeriana

1x Agonopterix arenella

2x Agonopterix heracliana

1x Agonopteris purpurea

1x Depressaria chaerophylli

1x Semioscopsis steinkellneriana

Acleris cristana

Agonopterix purpurea

The most successful trap position

Common Carpet

Depressaria chaerophylli

Depressaria radiella

Yellow-barred Brindle

Small Waved Umber

Semioscopsis steinkellneriana

Least Black Arches

Nut-tree Tussock

Phaneta pauperana