Staying Wild:Tales From The Garden Moth Trap

  After being pretty "wild-less" for a week I finally managed to get the Moth Trap put back together after its vacation in South Wales and ready for a warm July evening with a nice cloudy forecast.
  So after the disappointment of watching Wales lose to Ronaldo I need a pick me up, so trap out, moth net at the ready for any early arrivals.
  It didn't take long before the first Moths came in.
Marbled Beauty

Small Magpie turned out to be the most numerous moth of the night with 6

  They were shortly followed by an invasion of Arches

  Dark Arches

  Light Arches

  One of the more common Moths of the garden, a Large Yellow Underwing, named after it's stunning orange/yellow hindwings.

  Gothic

  Rustic

A very worn Heart and Club

  Cabbage Moth

  Beautiful Golden Y

  Small Dusty Wave

  Green Pug

  Common Emerald

  The only Hawkmoth of the night, an Elephant Hawkmoth.

  The first Swallowtail Moths of the year :)

  Other Moths from the night were Snout, Riband Wave, Bee Moth, Small Angle Shades, Bright-Line Brown-eye, Marbled Minor, Uncertain, Common Footman and Heart and Darts.

  In total there were 58 moths of 27 species.

  Mothing is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get ;)

30 Days Wild:Day 19 - Moth Invasion!!

                                                                

  Day 19 in Pembrokeshire was a very wet day, rain all day and quite blustery.Luckily though I had set the Moth trap up the night before so despite the wet weather I got up just before 5am and went to check the trap.

  There were moths everywhere, on the walls, on the shed, in the grass and the trap was filled with them :) Rain doesn't always ruin a moth night and can sometimes be quite helpful, its the wind which usually makes things a bit moth-less.

  I counted and photographed 51 species(don't worry I won't post them all ;)) but there were hundreds more I couldn't pot as I ran out of pots long before Moths.So here are some of the best from yesterday.

  Ghost Moth (female)

  Small Fanfoot 

  Buff Arches 

  

Peach Blossom 

  Purple Clay 

  Scallop Shell 

  Beautiful Golden Y

  Buff Tip

  Burnished Brass 

  Grey Arches

  Barred Straw

  Clouded Silver

  Beautiful Carpet 

  Knot Grass

  Peppered Moths

  Drinker Moth

   Brussels Lace

  Blood-vein

  Light Emerald

  Pebble Prominent 

  Campion

  Grey Dagger

  Elephant Hawkmoths 

  Poplar Hawkmoth

  That is just half of the species that came to light yesterday, many of them probably feed around your garden during the night, we just don't see them like we do Butterflies and we definitely don't appreciate them as much.If anyone ever says Moths are dull just show them a couple of my photos to prove them wrong ;)