Mixed blessings

Here is my first big black beetle of 2014, pretending convincingly to be dead. Along with the year's first earwig it brought variety to a trap whose contents were surprisingly sparse after a lovely warm evening which tempted us out to saunter along the canal, nattering to residents in snug narrowboats from all over the country whose woodsmoke scents this place.

At some stage in the night it turned a lot colder and now we have a dull morning. My camera's red light warning of wobble came on a few times as I photographed the eggboxes, which is always a sign of poor light. Still, the year's first Red-green Carpet brought me pleasure. It will have been tempted out of hibernation as we're a little early for the first 2014 brood.

I was also pleased to get this picture of a Chocolate-tip preparing to fly off and thus more like a dart than the usual crouching moth you see in pictures with its wings folded tightly in. Alas, judging by this wing fragment, it looks as though there was another one outside the trap which has been nabbed by a bird.

Finally, this micro was so tiny that I almost missed it. I've tried to add scale with my trusty Biro. I think it's Caloptilia semifascia (sounds like a half-hearted extreme right-winger) but would be grateful if any passing micro-expert knows. I will put out the same appeal on Upper Thames Moths.