Another fine Pine

To my surprise, I opened the trap yesterday morning to find this Pine Hawk moth in pristine condition inside. You can see the impressive size of it in comparison with the smaller moth alongside, from memory a Silver Y. What interested me is that this is the third Pine Hawk in what looks like a very-recently emerged state of repair to come to my light over a prolonged period.  

Here are the three of them, almost exactly at monthly intervals; unusual, it seems to me, for a species which normally has only one generation, albeit one which flies from May all the way through to September. I have had battered examples early and late before and I am sure that big, powerful hawk moths can live a long time. But I will ask about the freshness on the Upper Thames Moths blog.

Meanwhile, another two Latticed Heaths arrived and, although this one chose to perch on the photo-unfriendly black trap bowl like the one in my last post, it gave me - and you -  a clearer view of its topwings, so similar to a fritillary butterfly's. By contrast, the beautiful patterning of the Marbled Beauties below is absolutely characteristic of moths; much more complicated and subtly subdued in colour than the simpler and brighter patterning of most UK butterflies.

I'm note sure what the chap below is but will endeavour to find out. From its shape, it may be a Tree-lichen Beauty like the two shown in the following photo. Although a newcomer for me this year, there are masses of these about at the moment and their green-ness is very variable. A wonderful example of a successful immigrant which was once very seldom seen.

I am also vague about my final pic - a bush cricket of some kind, I fancy. Update: Indeed.  Conehead obligingly IDs it in Comments as a male Southern Oak Bush Cricket, a remarkably successful immigrant and colonist, especially considering that it is one of the few crickets which cannot fly.

 

I'm a butterfly really, honest

If there was a competition for the moth which looks most like a butterfly, this dainty little visitor to the trap would win hands down. The Latticed Heath not only rests with wings raised or partly spread out instead of folded flat on its back like most moths, but its colour and patterning resemble butterflies’ such as the Duke of Burgundy Fritillary. 

I nearly missed this one, only the second visitor of its type to the light since we moved in 2013, because I was concentrating on the very pretty Scorched Carpet shown later in this post. It was only when I looked at the picture I’d taken of the latter that I saw the Latticed Heath - below. Luckily I hadn’t jogged it with my wrist. 

I have a little container called a Bug Bottle which I use occasionally for moths which I want to check more closely, to avoid the risk of their flying away. I managed to pop the Latticed Heath in and got several more pictures. But it refused to spread its wings, so we will have to be content with these glimpses of the top surface.

There was another  attractive moth asleep on the cowl whose transparency allowed me to make a definite ID: a Lesser Treble Lines Update: whoops, carried away by doing this on my iPhone, I got muddled as my kindly and very thorough Commentor says. I meant Lesser Treble-bar. With my ineptness over getting moths right, I have never been able to distinguish between this species and the simple Treble Lines Update: Treble-bar. Today I could, thanks to being able to see its underside - second picture below:

The helpful illustration on the Moth Bible shows clearly which of the two it is. Hooray! And please don’t anyone prove me wrong.

There was however a second similar moth on an egg box in the trap whose nether regions could not be seen. So that has to remain an either/or. 

 

Here now is the Scorched Carpet, a beautiful moth even though its name evokes childhood accidents after playing with fireworks or matches. It too obliged with its underwings. 

During all these goings-on around the cowl, a bright little Orange Swift got on to the outside of the Bug Box but I had one more interesting visitor resting on the transparent section. This finely-shaped moth is a Pebble Hook-tip. I couldn’t see its underwing because, like many moths before it, it had chosen the rough, heavily-Sellotaped section of the plastic where cracks have been badly repaired (by me). Whether these are easier to grip or more reassuring in possible camouflage terms, I have yet to discover. Or there may be another reason altogether. 

A few more arrivals to go on this post which incidentally is the first I have written on my iPhone. I only discovered today that this was possible and the app is extremely handy and user-friendly. First a Tawny Speckled Pug spp fulvata, the commonest variation of the species in the UK:

Then the micro Agriphila tristella  - but what is that little green thing in the background? 

Aha! It’s a caterpillar which one day will turn into an Angle Shades moth; a very ordinary looking larva for an adult insect whose raked wings are unusual and dramatic.  Update: thanks again to my commentor who doubts this and makes other sensible ID suggestions. I will follow them up shortly.

Almost there now; just two sides - or rather the side and top - of Agapeta hamana whose size and distinctive banana milkshake colouring assure it of a welcome in our garden. 

Then we’ve another rather appealing micro which I’ll have to ID later and finally a Buff Footman which preferred the gloom of a neighbouring walnut tree’s trunk. Update: my commentor's third kindly act is to suggest that the micro is either Monopis laevigella (the Skin Moth) or its relative Monopis weaverella, both of which look likely and both of which, though common, would be new for me. From the size of the cream blob on the 'ridge' formed by the moth's wings, I would go for weaverella. The caterpillars of both these moths live on 'foodstuffs of animal origin' including carcasses and pooh. Yuk!

Black (and Grey and Pink) Arches

 

Please forgive a bit of self-indulgence but I always feel impelled to celebrate the arrival of the Black Arches, a feast of op-art with added pink and pale grey. It also has terrific antennae in the male, as in the upside-down picture above.

The first one I saw was on a wall near the trap and then there was a second in the eggboxes. I am afraid that I cannot resist copying my grandchildren and enticing them on to my finger to demonstrate the grey underwings and pink body shown in the two pictures, left and below:

The Black Arches' 'dazzle' camouflage contrasts with the strategy of the Knot Grass, one of which was resting on the wall not far from the Black Arches but had escaped my notice. The moth merged extraordinarily well into its background; only the little pale 'moustache' shows. 

The Knot Grass is quite a variable moth and by chance there was another in the eggboxes, paler and with an even more distinctive 'tash:

Other overnighters included a second Op-art moth, the Small Magpie micro which is bigger than quite a few UK macro moths, a Smoky Wainscot, a Nut-tree Tussock, a Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing with its Malvolio leggings and a Lychnis.

Newcomer No 10

It's only a week since I was announcing eight new species for the year so far and expressing the hope that I might get to ten. Now I have - though I also have to apologise that the photos of my tenth newcomer, above, are so bad. It's a Waved Black, one of the very few UK moths to have this colour. The actual moth is indeed largely black but I am afraid that the background of the black plastic trap bowl and the iPhone's digital quest for lightness plays pop with the image.

So did my grandchildren who were taking a keen interest in the eggboxes and were naturally more interested in having colourful moths to put on their fingertips. I almost missed the Waved Black altogether and I'm glad I didn't. It is ranked Nationally Scare B, the third rarest group after NS-A and the small Red Data Book list.

In spite of this exalted status, it is another success story which has come my way even if its expansion has not been rapid as the Clifden Nonpareil's or the Narrow-bordered Hummingbird Hawk moth's. In the 19th century, it was thought to be a London-only species, as black as the capital then was, but better record-keeping and probably an actual expansion in range saw finds increase during the last century as far as Hampshire and south Oxfordshire. Since 1990, it has been found in Worcestershire and Nottinghamshire and there have been a few sightings much further North including one in Cumbria in 2011, although that may have been an immigrant. And now Thrupp is added to the list.

As for the grandchildren and finger-moths, here are some examples below: the everlastingly popular Poplar Hawk, whose flight season goes on and on, an Iron Prominent and a nicely-marked Orange Swift, the last new for this year. This has the distinction of being the very first moth in the Moth Bible.

Among other visitors were a Dark Swordgrass, a lot of Swallow Prominents, the micro Celypha striana and another variantion of the Common or Lesser Common Rustic.

And to round things off, I had an unusual visitor: this rather beautifully mottled Leopard Slug. It has already been confirmed on iRecord, whose kindly experts must have very varying workloads.