Palely loitering

Apart from all the Emperor excitement - and more of that in a moment - the moth trap is relatively quiet at the moment; a steady but small supply of regular visitors such as the two Swallow Prominents, the long-seasoned Brindled Beauty ans Muslin moths. But the last of these has furnished interest, with an unusually large number of much paler versions than usual.

Yesterday saw the arrival of the palest of all; you can see the contrast between them in my top photograph and the one above.  I know that the related Ermine moths can vary quite a lot in the white, buff and grey end of the colour spectrum, so I did some checking for variations of them. But these are definitely both Muslins.

You can see from the frontal views that the pallor extends to the famous yellow knee breeches which enliven this otherwise slightly austere moth. Like male Muslins in general, they both have their fine antennae out and they also share the sort of shaggy hairstyle which many of us humans are developing in the absence of hairdressers - yay! back to the Sixties!

Note my morning tea in the background

I did some Googling online and came up with a range of pictures of paler Muslins, for example on Wildlife Insight here, and there is some speculation that a version of what has hitherto been known as the 'Irish form' may be spreading. That is almost pure white, but then so is the fur of my little visitor. I will send my pictures to iRecord to add to the database.

The Emperors, meanwhile: my Empress is still here, entirely passive and apparently content to stay put. She has been in the shed, apart from occasional spells when I took her eggbox out into the sunlight for a change - and, I must admit, to see if any more assembling might take place.  At least three males visited the garden during the delightfully warm and sunny day yesterday and on Tuesday, but none paid her any court. So I have tucked her into a hawthorn hedge where she was sitting quietly this morning.

As Penny sympathetically observes, she has had a tiring time in the egg production department. Indeed, this turns out to be, almost certainly, even more impressive than I had thought.  When I went to inspect the trap yesterday morning, it had been frosty and there were no moths on the nearby house wall. But an unusual shape caught my eye, and it was this: yet another cluster of eggs, and they look very much like the Empress's.