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

Sunday, 27 August 2023

Just a couple of new ones but what a pair!

Cooler nights have now started here in the east, temperatures went as low as 8.9c last night here and subsequently there was very little in the way of moth activity compared with a week ago.
The humidity has abated, a welcome changing for working outdoors as I do, but not so good for mothing, can't have it both ways!
 
The complete surprise on Tuesday morning, was opening the trap at 5am and seeing a large Hawk-moth clinging to the top egg tray, I was like wow, Striped Hawk... then later on after posting a picture it was pointed out to me that it was a Bedstraw, oops a bit of a brain fart moment! 
Hands up, I was wrong.. but was I bothered? not one iota (Nb unlike some childish kids on Twitter for example #rant over).
It appears it's fairly frequent in the county of cambs, but it certainly is a first for me having never seen one anywhere before.
 
The second moth was the sister-species of Agriphila tristella, the rather distinct selasella, which features different palps, cleaner ground colour, straight thicker white longitudinal streak that does not finger off vertically in tristella.

Another garden tick and which now brings the site list upto 783 species.

 
Moth garden list for 2023 stands at 585 species


21/08/23 - Back Garden - Fordham - East Cambridgeshire - Actinic Trap

Macro Moths

Bedstraw Hawk-moth 1 [NFG]
 
Micro Moths
 
Agriphila selasella 1 [NFG]

Bedstraw Hawk-moth

Agriphila selasella


Posted by Bennyboymothman at 20:13

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