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

Friday, 24 April 2020

That's much better!


Well, what a difference the lack of a cold easterely blowing through the garden makes.

Yesterdays temperature hit 23c and although it was still breezy, it wasn't as bad. 

The breeze lasted into the night and has now completely disappeared entirely, this bodes well for the nights ahead hopefully.
But firstly onto last night, and wow what a change, with four times the species over previous nights and with 8 new for year species recorded (1 pending) it was certainly a marked improvement and very welcome indeed after two weeks of blanks and less than 5 moths each outing.

Best macro moth of the night was a very pale Powdered Quaker, far from common here and the best micro moth went to Pseudoswammerdamia combinella, a moth that had only been previously recorded once here before in 2014, a little tatty but you can't have it all.

Numbers still low in relation to species, this is a running trend for my garden, compared to others who trap several hundred in one night, most of the year here is made up of singleton species on each trap outing.

Garden species count for 2020 now upto 75 (with a Stigmella pending).


24 moths of 19 species to 250w Clear MV Robinson Trap

Catch Report - 23/04/20 - Back Garden - Stevenage - North Herts

Macro Moths

Pale Mottled Willow 1 [NFY]
Powdered Quaker 1 [NFY]
Rustic Shoulder-knot 1 [NFY]
Waved Umber 1 [NFY]
Brindled Pug 4
Common Quaker 1
Double-striped Pug 1
Early Thorn 1
Frosted Green 1
Least Black Arches 1
Nut-tree Tussock 1
Shuttle-shaped Dart 3

Micro Moths

Alucita hexadactyla 1 [NFY]
Incurvaria masculella 1 [NFY]
Pseudoswammerdamia combinella 1 [NFY]
Stigmella sp 1 [NFY] TBC
Epiphyas postvittana 1
Eriocrania subpurpurella 1
Phyllonorycter quercifoliella 1

Alucita hexadactyla

Incurvaria masculella

Pale Mottled Willow

Powdered Quaker

Pseudoswammerdamia combinella

Rustic Shoulder-knot

Stigmella sp

Waved Umber

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