Big brothers

Hello there! Greetings from the two biggest hawk moths in my newly-expanded total of nine: the rakishly angled Pine Hawk, above and below, and the Privet Hawk, the UK's third biggest moth after the Convolvulus and Death's Head Hawks. Both were in the trap this morning when I went out rather than later than usual. 

The birds were about by then, notably a robin and a blackbird which were well aware of what was going on. Only yesterday, I found a blackbird in the shed where I put the trap during the day. It was looking for a meal but luckily hadn't got very far.

I didn't want to leave anything to chance, so I tickled both insects into life which had the double benefit of allowing me to photograph them with their wings outstretched, in the Privet's case showing that tasteful pink on the body and underwings; and of seeing them fly safely into the shelter of a tall oak tree before the birds could get their act together.

Here's the Privet in the final stages of warming up to fly. When they took off, they were almost as big as the robin in flight. Meanwhile, the number and variety of arrivals has been growing. Here are some of them:

Orange Footman

Silver-ground Carpet

Sandy Carpet

Flame Shoulder

Yellow-barred Brindle

Pseudagyrotoza conwagana micro

Heart and Dart with attendant Maybugs and Common Wainscot

And on its own

Poplar Grey - Update: sorry, it's a Knot Grass.  Many thanks to hawk-eyed Conehead in Comments

Angle Shades

Iron Prominent

Middle-barred Minor with fly

Shuttle-shape Dart

Seraphim

Common Wainscot No 2

Common Carpet

Busy times!

Whiskers

The Longhorn family of micro-moths are blessed, or cursed, with unfeasibly long antennae which always make me smile when I see them waving around in the trap. They are tiny creatures which makes the size of the antennae even more striking. Apparently some species especially enjoying dancing in the air in sunlight, a hobby where their antennae may come in useful to avoid collisions. One of the 20-odd species found in the UK, Nemophora degeerelia, has the longest antennae of any British moth including giants such as the Privet Hawk.

I think that this one is Adela reaumurella, perhaps named after a 19th century heroine with the same name as Miss Cuthbert, the adoptive mother of Anne of Green Gables, but I will check with Upper Thames Moths. Meanwhile my next picture shows the idiosyncrasies of digital cameras as they helpfully hunt around for maximum light.  This is the same moth photographed from two different angles, a Willow Beauty if I am correct and in very good condition.

Here is another one, below, followed by a couple of composites because so many moths are winging in at the moment.

A pair of pairs: two Silver Ys at the top, the second one considerably smaller than the first, and two Buff Ermines, a moth with immensely variable combinations of creamy background and black spots.

A Poplar Grey with its distinctive 'eyes', a Something I Don't Recognise (Update - with many thanks to Stewart in Comments, it's a Rustic Shoulder-knot which I should know by now but probably never will), a Small Square-spot and a Light Brocade

My first Peppered Moth of the year meanwhile arrived, the salt-and-pepper version which has largely replaced the darker, melanic form which was dominant in the days of industrial pollution - the famous instance of camouflage aiding the survival of the fittest.

And here, to conclude for now, is a nice fat beetle with - I think - baby beetles clinging to its head (please correct me if I am wrong; it has made its getaway) and a cosy pairing of another Buff Ermine and a Poplar Hawk, the latter one of six in this morning's trap.

Scorching - and that's not just the weather

I can never have enough of the Scorched Wing, whose camouflage is a marvellous example of 'dazzle', upsetting the eye's focus and blurring where the insect begins and ends. There was one in the trap last night, one on the rain shield and this one on the wall of the house. A satisfying trio.

Not all moths are blessed with lovely colouring of course, and here is the dull but worthy Brown Rustic which probably conforms to many people's idea of a British moth, just as so many of our birds are brown and small. But even this livery is interesting when examined closely and of course makes excellent camouflage on a wall or the bark of a tree.

Here's another exercise in broken shapes and colours, above, on the thumbnail-sized micro-moth Phtheochroa rugosana, a hard-to-say name in the cumbersome style of so many accorded to these little creatures. And next, a moth which has excellent colouring for disguise but also a burly hairiness which might put off an inquisitive bird. It's a male Pale Tussock, distinguished by its bushy antennae and the fact that the female is even bigger.

This is the sort of moth, above, which drives me nuts and I have yet to decide whether it's a Rustic of some kind or something different. After all these years, they faze me. If you recognise it, please put an end to my sufferings by telling me what it is. No such problems with the weird-looking pair below: one of the many maybugs or cockchafers which are coming to the trap at the moment, teaming up with a Poplar Hawk, which is also around in large numbers.

I posted a picture of a Coxcomb Prominent earlier and here is another, holding some kind of discussion with a Green Carpet, of which there are at least ten in the eggboxes every morning. Following them, another micro and luckily for me, a distinctive one: Hedya pruniana or the Plum Tortrix. Very good friends gave us a plum tree for our Ruby Wedding last year, so that may account for its happy arrival.

I normally show the Figure of 80 moth from the side as it tends to furl its wings tightly, but here is one from this morning's guest list which obligingly spread them out. It much resembles a Nut-tree Tussock in this position although the two are not related.

I shall have to check the rather dull carpet moth above on Upper Thames Moths' blog but for now, I suggest that it may be a May Highflyer.  Next we have two regulars both new for this year: the narrow-winged, rather fierce-looking Clay and a Shears, I think, although the little pairs of nippers on the wings are not as distinctive as usual. 

An easy one next, with that big pale X on its wings: a Clouded-bordered Brindle and after that a Mottled Pug, very tiny for a macro-moth and with its three distinctive little marks like thorns on each wing.

So to a Lychnis and, just to vary things a little, a Small Heath butterfly out enjoying the lovely sunny weather.

And lastly, a couple of pics of hawk moths which I find hard to resist as regular readers will know. Can you spot the Poplar and Eyed Hawks at rest on our garden wall? And behold a pair of Eyed Hawns on the hands of two visitors, one peeping, the other not.

In the light of the moon...

Inevitably, this blog tends to show pictures of adult moths which are only one stage of the four-part process of an insect's life. By chance this morning, when I was photographing a couple of hawk moths on the garden table beside the trap, I came across the first part of the journey: eggs.

Who they belong to, I have no idea and they may not even be a moth's. Among other candidates, when I Googled 'bright green insect eggs', are the Green Shield Bug and other creatures of that ilk.  I have popped them in a box with an assortment of leaves and will keep an eye on what happens and let you know. Rearing caterpillars can be a bit time-consuming but I have always got the grandchildren in London to fall back on.

They have already taken charge of the caterpillar below, having prudently and responsibly checked in advance what food it would require to survive. Unlike Eric Carle's Very Hungry Caterpillar, most moth larvae have a preference and it is one of the minor wonders of Nature that their mother will lay her eggs on or near the favoured plant.

This fussiness can apply to  caterpillars described as omnivorous (a useful addition to the grandchildren's vocabulary this weekend) because once they have got used to a particular leaf, they can be reluctant to change. My problem with this caterpillar, which I found curled up in the moth trap, most unusually, was that I didn't know what it was.

Enter, as usual, the inestimable Upper Thames Moths blog where John Thacker identified it as a Satellite moth's, a common species here. This was handy because they are omnivores and the children will be able to find plenty to keep it happy. Omnivore in the Satellite's case means what it says; when they are close to maturity, their diet includes other, smaller caterpillars of their own or other species. That's the sort of fact which excites a child's interest. 

Meanwhile the moths' High Season continues apace, with the warm nights bringing more and more lovely things to the eggboxes.  Here are some of them, with more to follow in my next post:

The Alder moth - a garden first here although I had them in Leeds prior to 2013

A cuddly male Pale Tussock with its habit of resting with forepaws outstretched

Ditto, but on the move. Taken just prior to take-off

A Buff-tip actually on the lamp which I had only just turned off. A rare event and it seemed quite happy, though very sleepy. Another one in an eggbox, below

A Scorched Wing with its eye-defocussing camouflage, on the rain shield. There were two more in the trap and one on a nearby wall

Pebble Prominent, another paw stretcher

Common but pretty - a Marbled Minor

And finally, the finely-named and strikingly-coiffed Coxcomb Prominent