Catching up

The weather and other demands have limited trapping in the last few days, so I have been checking on recent arrivals for moths which I have not featured here. They include this trio of Prominents - Swallow, Pebble and Iron - which all obligingly spread their wings to an extent while at rest, rather than holding them tightly together in the usual position which gives them their characteristic, streamlined profile.

Completely different, we have had a series of virtually tame Red Admiral butterflies seeking out warm, sunlit walls on which to rest. You spot them when they open their wings to bask and thus add a small splash of red to the landscape of grey and honey-coloured stone. This one, however, closed its wings just when I had finally sorted myself to take the picture. The underside is much duller and more camouflaged, but it is still a lovely-looking insect.

The next picture appeals to me as another trio, this time of odd companions: a worn Mother-of-Pearl micro-moth, a Common Carpet and a fine little beetle. Then we have the beige version of the Flounced Rustic which makes a nice change from the more usual darker grey ones, and finally an irresistible Brimstone moth.

I also like this huddle of yellow underwings, a very common sight in the trap at this season, both in numbers and in their habit of cramming into eggbox cones together which would emphatically not appeal to many other, more private, species, judging my the habits which I have observed over the years.

And lastly, harking back to my reference to streamlined Prominents, here is another, much smaller moth which adopts the 'racing car' stance while resting: the micro Evergestis forficalis, known familiarly as the Garden Pebble.

Trebles all round

It's a pleasure to have been visited this week by the moth in my first two pictures which is either a Treble-bar or a Lesser Treble-bar; the two are too similar for your humble servant to tell apart. The family also includes a slightly more exciting-looking Purple Treble-bar and - a moth which appeals greatly to my Northern connections - a Manchester Treble-bar.

As with the mystery of hawk moth caterpillar horns, I have failed as yet to find an explanation online for the 'Manchester' part of this name, other than the rather vague suggestion that the moth is commonest in northern parts of the UK.  The excellent website of the Islay Natural History Trust, reporting last year on finding three Manchesters in a moth trap, notes wryly: "We're not very close to Manchester, but this attractive small moth has a scattered distribution across Scotland as well as northern England."

Initially I wondered if it was named by the finely-named taxonomist and great 20th century moth expert Louis Beethoven Prout whose obituary is here . His father was another outstanding character, the musician and teacher Ebenezer Prout, on whom there is more online if you are in a dilly-dallying mood. Prout junior gave the moth its scientific name of Carsia sororiata in 1937 but the English name was already in use in 1830 when the beautiful engraving below was made by John Curtis for his celebrated part-work British Entomology. The Manchester was also known to Curtis as the Dyed Treble-bar, so perhaps a set of references to the colourful textile industry of the supposedly 'grim' North provides the answer.

I am very familiar with the only other moth to have 'Manchester' in its English name, albeit a name which is little-used as the species is a micro which has not been seen alive since 1829. Here, below, is a summary of its interesting history from my book True North, which I urge you to buy at every opportunity, and for all friends' birthdays etc.

The story had a further complication in that the moth's scientific name of Euclemensia woodiella was given to it by none other than John Curtis who was sent one of Cribb's catches by a mutual friend and collector, and made a mistake in his attribution, which was printed in British Entomology alongside the fine engraving below:

"The only specimen I have seen of this beautiful Moth, which is larger than the others, is a female; it was taken on Kersall-moor the middle of last June by Mr. R. Wood, of Manchester, to whom I have the pleasure of dedicating it;—a most zealous and successful naturalist, to whose liberality I am indebted for many valuable insects."

This error further increased the sufferings of poor Cribb, who sadly never lived to see history re-establish him as the true make of a notable moth discovery.

To conclude, here are some more of my visitors earlier this week:

A Common White Wave

A well-named Snout

A Flame Carpet

and a Green one

Flame and Green together, the second a faded specimen whose green has all but gone

Dusky at dusk

Penny the ace indoor moth spotter has been at it again, glancing up at the kitchen ceiling while cooking last night and spotting a tiny moth - scarcely bigger than your average micro but with the wings-spread-at-rest habit which is characteristic of macro moths.

After an intrepid if slightly wobbly balancing act on the work surface, I took the picture above and ID-ed the visitor as a Small Dusky Wave, a common species but one which I have only ever had in the trap once, in September 2014. I found another one on a wall in London, quite by chance, two years ago. It was gloaming time, and like our kitchen visitor, the moth had been attracted by a house light. Update: Apologies; I am carried away by my cunningly punning headline. It is Dusty not Dusky. Many thanks to Alastair in Comments for putting me right.

Grandchildren etc have kept me very busy in the last few days but I hope to put the trap out again tonight. Today is sunny and warm but rain lurks, as happened yesterday - a blissful afternoon was followed by a veritable downpour.  Oh, and I will add the picture below of a lovely second brood White Ermine which called by last week - my granddaughter's favourite moth.

Same difference

I have a couple more 'top-and-bottom' pictures this morning, but first, here is a little composite of four Lime-speck Pugs, the slender little scrap whose resemblance to a bird dropping is thought to give it extra protection, birds not being given to eating their own poo.

This theory has flaws, I suspect, in that birds' vision is different from our own, and the Lime-speck's similarity to a dropping is very much a conclusion reached via human eyesight. I mentioned only yesterday how moths resting inertly on the trap top are clearly visible to us but go apparently unseen by the usually voracious and inquisitive robins, blackbirds and magpies which are well aware of the trap as a high class restaurant.

I put the pictures together to illustrate the slight variations common to almost all species of UK moths, just as we have countless little differences between us in the human race. The second Lime-speck is much less clearly patterned than the others, while the top one has a more jagged white line at the wing edge than the two at the bottom. In less distinctive species, this accounts for my hopelessness in giving accurate IDs. I am sorry that the photos are not better but I am still relying on my limited - albeit faithful - iPad Mini. 

Here are the top-and-bottoms: another Willow Beauty which thoughtfully chose a clearer section of the cowl than yesterday's; and a Blood-vein. In both cases you can see that the patterning is essentially the top wings' showing through to below (only sketchily, too, in the case of the Willow Beauty), rather than a whole separate coat of scales in a different formation or colourway. The underneath of a moth is seldom seen at rest which would account for the  drabness common to most species; but since it appears in flight, albeit only very fleetingly as moths jink violently about, it is perhaps surprising that none - to my knowledge - have more vivid colours to deter birds zooming from below.

Downside up

When I was mystified the other day by what turned out to be the common and regular visitor at this time of the year, a Straw Underwing, one of the extremely helpful experts on the Upper Thames Moths blog, Martin Albertini, described the species as 'a major banana skin', because the key to its ID lay in its hindwing, so often hidden when a moth is at rest.

I am not sure what I can do about this, because getting a moth to reveal its pants, as it were, usually involves annoying it so much that it flies away. But occasionally even skittish moths, such as the Willow Beauty in my first two pictures today, allows a longer look, especially when they choose to perch on the light trap's transparent cowl, thus revealing their underwings. 

That is the view in the first picture; not an ideal study because my cowl is so old and bashed about, but it gives a pretty clear impression. The second picture shows the species' familiar topside which is what I normally see.

The hindwing problem is less easily solved; an issue which did not arise in my younger days when cameras were so hopeless for close-up work - at least the ones which I could afford such as the Brownie 127 - that killing specimens was the general rule. You then 'set' them by spread-eagling them on cork boards with a slot down the middle to take the insect's body. Here are some examples from a visit I paid to Sulawesi in Indonesia where the butterflies are among the most striking in the world:

I am adding a close-up of the wonderful blumei Swallowtail in the top left-hand corner which I caught after a dramatic and prolonged hunt along a jungle river. Killing is out of order now except for serious scientific researchers but I am happy that this butterfly and its colleagues in the display case have done a lot of posthumous good, through enthralling visitors and interesting quite a few of them in a subject which they had disregarded previously.

Back at home and up to date, my musings on the trap cowl prompt me to show a couple of visitors this morning: a Poplar Hawk using the decaying remains of Sellotape on a crack repair to cling upside-down, and a Swallow Prominent whose presence on the outside of the cowl - unmolested by birds which seem unable to detect a completely passive moth -had dried up the surrounding dew.

Nursery world

Last week I featured a clutch of bright green eggs which had been laid on the metal collar of the moth trap by an unknown visitor. I had no idea whether they would hatch but they caused great fascination to my visiting grand-daughter whose excitement at having moths on her fingers was exceeded by this novel concept of carrying moth eggs around in a little box and showing them to everyone she met.

Now they have hatched - and into something which should add more interest and enjoyment to the grand-daughter's young life. They have produced the caterpillars of one of the hawk moths; I suspect a Poplar Hawk whose second generation is the only one around in the eggboxes at the moment (see bottom picture of one which called this morning). I am trying them with a mixture of willow and buddleia (not having any poplars nearby, although that has never stopped Poplar Hawks from being a very frequent visitor. Willows are their larvae's secondary foodplant.

The feature that most fascinates me about these tiny new arrivals in my home is that the familiar horn at the end of the caterpillar's tail is already one of its most distinctive features. In the US it has led to their alternative title of 'hornworms'. I am Googling desultorily to see if I can find any information about the purpose of the horn and will pass it on if I do. My main discovery is how easy it is to buy moth eggs commercially for rearing the insects, but I do not have time to go into caterpillar kindergarten work on a major scale.

Wibble wobble

I balanced the trap a little precariously on a wall last night and paid for my bravado by waking at 4.30am in a state of alarm that it might have fallen off and caused some electrical or other drama. I have always shared the fascination shown by children - and cats and other animals - in balancing on walls. Indeed, the practice has a precious place in our family lore because my older sister was once ticked off by a wall-owner who asked her: 'Little girl, what would you say if I came and walked along your wall?' We couldn't think of a reply at the age of six or seven, but the prospect of this portly gent teetering past our windows was enthralling.

It never happened, sadly, but last night I thought that I would heave up the trap on our wall so that it might be spotted by moths in a neighbouring patch of un-mown field where a couple of years ago, a Large Emerald came to the lamp. There was nothing so magnificent last night but at least my early morning worries proved groundless. Here's a nice Dusky Thorn, above, and below are some more of the modest guest-list:

A Lesser Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing on my specs case

A delicate Common Wave, clearly getting on a bit but in pretty good nick

A Flounced Rustic

A Garden Carpet, maybe tempted by the meadow

I'm not sure about this chap (or chapess) though suspect he or she is something everyday which I ought to know. So I will check. Update: Dave Wilton of Upper Thames Moths nails it as a Straw Underwing which I should have known. Many thanks D!

And a somewhat indeterminate micro on which I will also have to spend research time. Update: thanks to my kindly Commentor, I am sure that this is Blastobasis adustella, an adventurous little chip from Madeira which arrived in the UK in horticultural produce and has thrived here.

Welly weather

The weather is most un-Summery in Oxfordshire at the moment, dripping wet and disappointingly cool when the showers do relent. Moth numbers are consequently well down and the luminous presence of an almost full moon also reduces the appeal of my artificial lamp. So no great surprises today.

My first two pictures show a couple of nice micros, though: the snouty Cochylimorpha straminea, above, and the very prettily-patterned Pandemis corylana, or Chequered Fruit-tree Tortrix, to the left. These tiny moths are easy to overlook or sideline during the morning inspection of the eggboxes but they repay examination through the camera lens, even with my sub-standard equipment and skills.

What the next moth is, I cannot say and I doubt that the experts will be certain either. It's taken a battering during its brief life and the remaining fragments of pattern do not really seem to add up. But I will add it to my list for submission to the ever-helpful identifiers on the Upper Thames Moths blog. Update: Dave Wilton on UTM confirms my doubts but suggests that it could have been a Lesser Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing.

Three dainties to conclude with: a tiny little Least Carpet, a Dark-barred Twin-spot Carpet and a Lime-speck Pug.