FlyinginFordham: A much warmer night, the moths appear

A very busy night (by recent standards) in my garden, with 14 new ones for the year and an incredible 59 species, it's amazing what a few more degrees makes.

Talking of degrees, the weather was pretty perfect, a far cry from tonights weather here. With lows of 15 degrees and a good chunk of lovely cloud to lock the warm day temperatures in.

I worked the trap up until nearly the next day, but tiredness got the better of me. Rising at 4:30, the trap wasn't heaving, 1's and 2's of a lot of species.

Species diversity is still strong here, but numbers are crashing year on year. Memories of traps full of common moths are fading repidly sadly, though I couldn't forget 30+ Dot Moths in one trap once, and possibly a record 224 Nutmegs over two MV traps back in 2014.

It will be very interesting to see what the next 10 years holds for our moths.

I digress

Back to the moths from Sunday night.. best species had to go to the miniscule Lyonetia prunifoliella netted early-doors at dusk, a rare moth here in Cambs and probably only rare because of how tiny it is, new for the garden.

Other cracking moths included not one, but 4 Elephant Hawk-moths, all spankingly fresh. Evergestis limbata was back, a regular little moth here and good to see once more, in fact the micros stole the show 11 to 3!

After all that excitement it's back to glum times.

Moth garden list for 2024 stands at 266 species

02/06/24 - Back Garden - Fordham - East Cambridgeshire - Actinic Trap

Macro Moths

Elephant Hawk-moth 1 [NFY]
Small Waved Umber 1 [NFY]
Straw Dot 1 [NFY]
Brimstone Moth 1
Buttoned Snout 1
Clouded Silver 2
Common Carpet 1
Common Swift 2
Common Wainscot 1
Coronet 1
Garden Carpet 1
Green Pug 2
Heart & Dart 1
Large Nutmeg 1
Large Yellow Underwing 2
Light Brocade 1
Marbled Minor 1
Orange Footman 1
Pale Mottled Willow 1
Pale Oak Beauty 1
Pale Tussock 1
Peppered Moth 1
Setaceous Hebrew Character 1
Silver Y 1
Small Dusty Wave 1
Snout 1
Treble Lines 1
Turnip Moth 3
Willow Beauty 4

Micro Moths

Acentria ephemerella 1 [NFY]
Agapeta hamana 3 [NFY]
Aleimma loeflingiana 1 [NFY]
Archips podana 2 [NFY]
Coleophora trifolii 1 [NFY]
Cydia pomonella 1 [NFY]
Epinotia bilunana 2 [NFY]
Evergestis limbata 1 [NFY]
Grapholita tenebrosana 1 [NFY]
Lyonetia prunifoliella 1 [NFG]
Neocochylis molliculana 1 [NFY]
Aphomia sociella 1
Argyresthia cupressella 2
Argyresthia spinosella 1
Blastobasis lacticolella 1
Bryotropha basaltinella 5
Crambus lathoniellus 1
Dichrorampha simpliciana 1
Ephestia sp 1
Epiphyas postvittana 1
Hedya pruniana 1
Hedya nubiferana 1
Hofmannophila pseudospretella 1
Lyonetia clerkella 1
Monopis crocicapitella 1
Notocelia trimaculana 1
Paraswammerdamia albicapitella 1
Parornix sp 1
Platyedra subcinerea 1
Plutella xylostella 1