End of week catch up - Part 2

Continued from last nights post
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Saturday 26th May - Carr Wood
I could hardly contain my excitement when I organised to go down to Carr Wood, considering that the weather looked like it was going to be good (a little cooler than the rest of the week but still warm) and also because the garden had started giving lots of year ticks. The previous two times we've trapped there have been fairly uneventful, giving us new ticks for the Wood but nothing unexpected.
We were joined by two members of the Amber Valley Council who brought down with them some bat detectors. So we set up the traps by 2115 and went down to the pond to join them watching the Pipistrelles catching midges between the trees. We counted up to five but there could have been more they're so blooming fast!
We lit the traps up at 2145 and straight away picked up plenty of flies and some sort of rove beetle(?). The moths weren't far behind with Common Swift the first to fall into the MV. The activity was pretty constant, every few minutes or so, so we were kept pretty busy. At 2300 as me and Ross from the council stood watching the trap, a Lime Hawk-moth dropped like a plane, bounced once off the lamp and fell straight into the trap! You can imagine how excited me and Jordan were! And this wasn't the only good moth of the night. Ross potted up a Grass Rivulet, which is new for me, and three tortrix turned out to be Capua vulgana, another newbie! The excitement kept us going till just after midnight and when we had packed up the traps and were sat writing up our findings by torchlight I noticed an orangey-coloured moth flitting about. I potted it up...and it was a Clay Triple-lines - another new for me!! Brilliant. Can't wait till National Moth Night to run another trap. If you fancy coming along then please send me an email!

Grass Rivulet

Unknown Stigmella species?

Clay Triple-lines

Final tally:

80W MBF Robinson-style trap		15W Actinic - 117W CFL Combo Skinner-style trap
Caloptilia syringella	3
Capua vulgana	2	Capua vulgana	1
Clay Triple-lines	1
Clouded Silver	1
Common Pug	5	Common Pug	6
Common Swift	2
Cork Moth	1	Cork Moth	2
Flame Carpet	1
Garden Carpet	2	Garden Carpet	1
Grass Rivulet	1
Green Carpet	2
Lime Hawk-moth	1
		Nematopogon swammerdamella	1
Scalloped Hazel	2	Scalloped Hazel	1
Shuttle-shaped Dart	1
		Silver-ground Carpet	1
Stigmella sp.	1
		Tinea trinotella	3
		Twenty-plumed Moth	1
White-shouldered House Moth	1	White-shouldered House Moth	1

Moth Yearlist is finally coming along nicely with 69.

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Sunday 27th May

A wander down to the River Amber with Jordan and a fishing mate this afternoon meant basically a few hours in the field both staring at a rod waiting for it to snap into action, and staring around the field/river looking for all things naturelle. A Kingfisher flew past us twice, and a Great Spotted Woodpecker called from a dead tree not too far off. Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs were singing, Demoiselles played in the nettles by the rivers edge, with the males doing circular flights around the female as she sat on the vegetation. Also found plenty of these Ramsons (I think?).

It was another gorgeous day and thoughts were already turning of moth-trapping again!

However before that, another friend texted me from their barbecue with a photo and the title "ID Please!" I opened it and found an Eyed Hawk-moth staring back at me. I quickly texted her back and she told me that the boys had found it in the Apple Tree and it was resting in a Wisteria. Five minutes later and Jordan had it in his hands! Awesome!

The trap went out again on Sunday night, with some more good results but I've run out of time (again) tonight, so I'll add that info to tomorrow's post.

A weekend of ups and downs

The temperatures looked ok-ish, the wind had dropped, it was dry. So why did we only catch three moths???

This was the result of our second trapping session in my local nature reserve - Carr Wood. I'm worried that if this carries on we may lose the interest of my semi-nature loving brother (who helps with all the carrying of equipment!). I'm gonna make sure that the next trip out there is in perfect conditions, just to prove to everyone that moths do actually live in Carr Wood (I'm not even sure of this myself now...)

Anyway, despite the poor form the three moths that we did catch were all new for the Carr Wood list. Hurrah!

1 x Green Carpet

1 x Eriocrania subpurpurella

1 x  another micro to be identified

EDIT: The omniscient Douglas from Montgomery Moths group has come up with the answer here, Zelleria hepariella. A new moth for me and for the Carr Wood list, so I am happy about this! Thanks Douglas!

After this disappointing night, the garden obviously felt that it needed to make up for it, and produced this Garden First - Adela reaumurella - on Sunday morning.

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Sunday was a lovely day, weatherwise, so we took the opportunity of an afternoon walk around a new site - Clough Wood near Winster. Well, we tried our best. But the navigator wasn't as good as my usual crew and so we ended up on the western side of the wood, in a deeply gouged farm track that my car found unpassable. So we walked for an hour along this road and eventually found Clough Wood, so at least we know where it is , but we still have to explore it properly.

We did have a good time though. A male Redstart put on a quick show in a hawthorn hedge, and a few other common woodland birds were going about their business. I did find some interesting plants (I'm finding plants/flowers more and more interesting, perhaps cos it's the only things I can photograph!?!).

I believe these are Yellow Dead-nettles (EDIT: Ragged Robin has pointed out that these are Yellow Archangel. Thanks RR!)

The bluebells are also fully in flower now and looked gorgeous as they carpeted the slopes running down to the stream.

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An evening to myself needed filling (I'm still feeling out-of-sorts from a cold I've had all week, so I've been a real grump today!) so I thought a trip to Netherfield Lagoons would sort me out. Netherfield hasn't been in the birdnews for a while but I thought that there would be something to see - it's always a good spot! The photo left shows the gravel pit viewed from the Deepwater Pit, the sun was casting a huge shadow over the lower pits.

The wind was blowing a hoolie again today, so lots of the smaller birds were hunkered down, however I did hear Blackcap, Reed, Sedge, Willow and a Cetti's Warbler and the Whitethroats were on show. A Kingfisher zipped by at one point, and the number of Swifts and hirundines was staggering, there was a good hatch as I walked back to the car so obviously they had anticipated this and collected here tonight ready for the feast! Once again my photography attempts turned to insects and flowers. These tiny purply-blue flowers caught my attention. I know I've seen them a hundred times, but the strain of not knowing their name is stretching my OCD to it's limit! If anyone can help out then I'd appreciate it. (EDIT: Again Ms Robin has pointed me in the direction of Ground Ivy. A lovely name for a very delicate little flower.)

The White-tailed bumblebee below wasn't put off by my presence in the slightest as it merrily fed on the White Dead-nettle.

 My other great find tonight was my first Red and Black Froghopper. I was suprised at how big it was, I'm used to getting the smaller greeny ones in the moth-trap, but this was a brute. I gave him a quick test of his strength by slowing nudging him off his perch, and my goodness he could jump!! Impressive beast!



Bank Holiday Blues

After having scouted round a few of the blogs I follow, I'm going to start off with a recurring theme...that of the weather being so poor that I haven't really done much at all. But this does give me time to update the blog with the results from the trapping session at Carr Wood on Saturday and then back in the garden last night (despite the rain!).

Carr Wood trapping was not exactly a thrill a minute, but it was certainly very interesting. It was the first time that I'd trapped by myself (but I had help from my non-mothing brother and my very-eager-moth-er son) and all went very smoothly, although it was generally agreed that carrying the generator to the same spot next time was not going to happen! The thing is so damn heavy that I'm going to either need some wheels or invest in my own (smaller) genny. Other than that we had no bother. One guy did walk his dog past us, and after watching him cast his eyes over the wooden boxes, petrol can, sheets and then across to us three stood round looking sheepish I assumed that he'd ask us what the hell we were up to. But he just said "Hello" and carried on past!

On to the moths...We ran 1 x 80W MV and 1 x 15W Actinic/20W CFL combo and the MV lost by 6 moths to 9. Not a great total, but the temperature dipped from 10C to 7C by 2200hrs, at which point it started to rain so we decided to pack up at 2230hrs. 15 moths in just under 2 hours isn't that bad going for a new site. And I'm confident that some warm weather and a bit more growth will bring us a much bigger haul.

Moth list was:
Common Quaker x 6
Hebrew Character x 2
Clouded Drab x 1
Twin-spotted Quaker x 1
Chestnut x 2
Diurnea fagella x 1
Agonopterix heracliana/ciliella x 1
Agonopterix arenella x 1



Twin-spotted Quaker

Diurnea fagella



Agonopterix arenella (new for year)

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8th April 2012 - Garden

Due to the imposing rain clouds, and predicted downpours, I decided to run the Actinic/CFL combo (and also because it out-performed the MV last night!) and not risk blowing my new MV bulb up. I left it out all night, and crossed my fingers that it wouldn't rain too badly before 6am. But it did, quite a few millimetres actually but fortunately the hardy bulbs didn't give up and I ended up with a very bedraggled 7 moths.

Hebrew Character x 3

Early Grey x 2

Twin-spotted Quaker x 1 (did it follow us home from Carr Wood?)

Agonopterix heracliana/ciliella x 1

Looks like there won't be much action this week either as the temperatures are set to stay pretty low during day and night! Well, just have to look forward to sunnier times. After all we're ready for this rain (that's what my parents keep saying anyway!)

Exciting plans

Newsflash - I've just been given permission by the local wildlife trust to trap in my local wood. I'm gonna put together a study of the moths, and am very excited. It's only a small piece of wood but it is really old so must have a good moth population. I've been birding there since I was little (saw my first Tawny Owl there) so it will be interesting to give something back. Hopefully the trust can use the data to safeguard it a bit more, before any more of it gets chopped down by [insert large supermarket chain here].

Trust it to be cold all next week though, but I don't think I'll be able to resist much past Saturday so I'll keep you posted on my moffing outside the garden!