Meet your greens

I must start looking for lime trees. I don't recall any growing near our house, but this morning the second hawk moth of this summer was slumbering in the trap. It's a Lime Hawk, whose caterpillars prefer lime, predictably. They will eat elm leaves too, but elms have long gone from round here. The moth looks a little worn, although it cannot have hatched too long ago; their season starts in mid-May. Contrary to the usual gloom about wildlife, this is a species on the increase. It was rare in Yorkshire until the 1950s, but has since settled, although it's not a common visitor to our garden. I've just checked back through my pre-blog records and found only one, on a warm June night like the one we've had: 9 June 2006.




More greens meanwhile. Apart from the Lime Hawk, last night produced a Green Arches, a moth with particularly subtle colouring which defies my camera skills, and another Green Silver Lines, this time a female. If you click on the lower picture, right, you can admire her lovely pink legs. I think and hope this species is here to stay.