Category: Lepidoptera

The Lime Hawk-moth, Mimas tiliae, is fairly common in Southern England, especially where there are avenues of lime trees, in London, for instance. However, the species has headed north, extending its range in recent years. This specimen was drawn to actinic light in our garden on the night of 17th May 2019. Specimens have been found in North Yorkshire, according to UK Moths.

Beautiful colours of greens and pinkish hues. although colour can vary considerably with a ruddier, rustier brown form out there too. The Lime Hawk-moth is a member of the Sphingidae, the Sphinx Moth family, which also includes the Hummingbird, Convolvulus, Privet, Elephant, Small Elephant, and Poplar Hawk-moths. Photos of specimens of Hummingbird, Elephant, Small Elephant (new 10th June 2019), Privet, and Poplar are in my Mothematical Gallery. 171 specimens as of 21st May 2019, with the addition of a new noctuid, Pale-shouldered Brocade, and a geometer, Oak Hook-tip, today.

I am hoping for Convolvulus, Eyed, and Deaths-head this year. In the British Isles, we have almost 20 species of Hawk-moth, also known as hornworms (because of the appearance of their larvae/caterpillars).

The range of moth species and the total number in and around the trap is picking up. Best night so far this year – 36 specimens of 21 species. There were a couple of species new for the year and at least one new to me.

The Shears (new to me, checking), Rustic Shoulder Knot, checking, Common Wainscot (NFY), Bee moth, Common marbled carpet (NFY), Garden carpet, SSD (4x), Common Pug, LBAM (3x), Brimstone, Muslin, Heart & Dart (2x), Turnip (4x), Twenty plume, Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing, Vine’s Rustic (5x), Common swift.

There were also three tiny, micro moths in the night two I have no photos and no clue, but one of them was very small and was perhaps this species: Apotomis betuletana, checking.

My Mothematics Gallery on Imaging Storm will have the latest lep stars with some details and their scientific names.

Long before I adopted mothing as one of the slightly weirder of my various hobbies (one that combines biology and photography with a bit of citizen science though), I still occasionally snapped lepidoptera if they turned up somewhere I had my camera. Back in May 2004, I caught sight of a huge, hairy moth in our conservatory. Got a snap and then spent ages trying to find out what species it was. Turned out to be Pale Tussock (Calliteara pudibunda).

The second time I saw one was 15 years later, on the corner of the actinic trap in the middle of May. As you can probably guess, it being the same month was no coincidence, the adults of this species fly May-June.

They’re a fairly common species in England and Wales, sexually dimorphic (the females are bigger and not so distinctively marked, but both have the forward facing hairy legs). According to the UK Moths site, the larvae feed on a range of deciduous shrubs and trees as well hops.

As ever you can keep up with the latest additions to my list either on my Moth Records spreadsheet or in the Mothematics Gallery on Imaging Storm.

Last night was a very different night  of mothing. It had been up to 20 degrees Celsius during the day but got down as low as 7 degrees Celsius in the night, it was still and dry, with a waxing gibbous moon. The haul one gets to an actinic light moth trap can never be predicted, but numbers were the highest they had been since the warm patch in April 2019, it’s now mid-May 2019.

I was very pleased to see one of the larger British moths sitting on the outside of the trap this morning, the very furry Puss Moth, Cerura vinula. This specimen was an impressive 4.5 centimetres long from front leg to wingtip and has the most striking patterning.

As you can see from my photos it is very furry, has broad white wings. The forewings have very dark concentric lines that look like indentations, there are dark cross veins on the wings and bronze lines radiating down the thorax. This specimen also has a greenish hue to its heads and black spots. Gently coaxing it from the trap into an examination pot was quite an eerie feeling, the large size and furriness make you think you’re handling a small, alien-looking mammal, rather than an insect.

Also new for me, potted as it approached the trap last night was a Coxcomb Prominent, Ptilodon capucina, a species common from Ireland to Japan in the Palearctic ecological zone.

It was the busiest night for moths in the garden last night for a month or so, also ticked this morning and last night, 12 species, 20 specimens:

Puss Moth, Red Twin-spot Carpet, Hebrew Character, male Muslin (2x), Shuttle-shaped Dart (6x), Turnip Moth (2x), The Streamer, Double-striped Pug, Common Pug, Heart & Dart (2x), Light-brown Apple Moth.

Incidentally, I remember seeing photos of the Puss Moth caterpillar in books when I was a child, it was often the cover star of a wildlife book, for instance. You may recognise it too. Incidentally, don’t annoy this larva, it can spray formic acid at you…

Just added another new moth species to the mothematical list, the Heart & Dart (Agrotis exclamationis). Here’s a focus-stacked shot looking down on the moth so you can see its “darts” and its “hearts”.

Here’s a face-on closeup, also focus stacked using digiCamControl to capture a sequence of six photos at different focus positions, front to back, and then aligning and stacking together with CombineZP. The stacking has not worked brilliantly in this shot, the antennae have artefacts, but at least you can see this species’ distinctive black band visible only when looking at the front of the thorax head-on.

Apparently, the Heart & Dart is one of the most common of the so-called owlets, the Noctuid moths, common in Europe and widespread in the UK, attracted to light and its larvae (known as cutworms in this genus of moths). The larvae eat all sorts of garden and wild plants, turnip, potatoes, maize, spinach, strawberries, lettuce, beetroot, as well as oak leaves and brambles.

The moth’s common name is perhaps obvious, but so too, in some sense, is the scientific binomial: Agrotis from the Greek for farmer, exclamationis meaning an exclamation! A farmer’s exclamation. Not a species to be encouraged in one’s new #AllotmentLife.

Of course, some cultures get their own back on the plant-eating moths, by eating the moths themselves. The related Bogong moth (Agrotis infusa) is an icon of Australian wildlife due to its historical role as a food source for Aboriginal people of Southeastern Australia, Its gathering led to inter-tribal feasting. The moths are roasted to remove wings and scales and often made into moth meat paste, which apparently has a nice, nutty taste.

Another one of those insects almost everyone else thinks of as grey or brown…just look at that pure greeeen.

Light Emerald (Campaea margaritaria). This is a geometer moth, which means its larvae “measure the earth”, they’re inchworms, in other words. Although I think it’s time they went metric AND they’re not worms…they’re larvae (moth caterpillars).

Although this moth is pretty much flat, I took three photos of it at different focus depths and then aligned and stacked them together (using digiCamControl and CombineZP, mentioned as my current free tools of choice for focus stacking some time ago on the blog.)

If you look closely you can see why moths and butterflies (essentially the same thing) are called Lepidoptera. (Lepis means scale, pteron means wing in ancient Greek, so – scaly wings)

The Maiden’s Blush moth, Cyclophora punctaria, Spring form is not as well marked as the Summer form where the blush is more obvious, but you can still see it here.

This species is a geometer moth, which means its larvae (caterpillars) move in such a manner that they seem to measure the earth, they’re known as inchworms in the USA and elsewhere. Specifically, this member of the Geometridae is a member of the sub-family Sterrhinae, which includes the “Least Carpet” and several “Wave” moths as well as the “Blood-veins”. The species was first described by Carl Linnaeus in 1758 in the 10th edition of Systema Naturae.

According to the UK Moths site, the species occurs in oak woodland, its larvae feeding on that tree. It is fairly common in the south of England, but scarcer up north and into Scotland. As with several other moths in the genus Cyclophora, in Western Europe it flies in the spring/early summer (May to June) and then has a second brood in August. The adults of the second brood are markedly smaller than the spring specimens.

This specimen of Maiden’s Blush flew to 40W actinic light trap overnight 24/25 April 2019. Along with a host of other moths: Brimstone, Muslin, Garden Carpet, Early Grey, Spectacle, Nutmeg, Powdered Quaker (another new for me pictured below), Shuttle-shaped Dart (6 of them).

You will not that I have called this post “Moth of the month”, don’t worry there will be more moths than once a month…

I’m slowly seeing new moths to my actinic light trap as the spring surges forward, a new one or two each day now. But, one of the stalwarts of the British mothing world posts to the major Facebook mothing group how he had almost 300 different moths to his trap, with 50+ species new for the year. I’m not sure I could cope and certainly wouldn’t be able to identify from memory all of the ones he cited.

My “haul” from last night was a lot more modest but interesting nevertheless…and manageable:

Shuttle-shaped Dart (7)
Male Muslin moths (3)
Double-striped Pug (2)
Brimstone
Hebrew Character
Common Plume
Waved Umber
The Mullein
Pebble Prominent
Nutmeg
Spectacle

Recent moths new to my “list” for the year, so I’d never seen before.

You will have spotted by now, my current fixation on the Emperor moth, Saturnia pavonia. It’s Britain’s only resident member of the Saturniidae family (related to the Silkworm moth). I have a pheromone lure that has some (6Z,11Z)-hexadeca-6,11-dien-1-yl acetate on it, which I bought from Anglian Lepidopterist Supplies. UPDATE: As of 2023, fifth season of checking on this species in our neighbourhood, still present and showing.

It took me a while to track down the name of that sex pheromone, exuded by the less colourful, night-flying females, to attract the colourful, day-flying males. I had photographed one or two on the wing but used a homemade butterfly net to catch the specimen you see above. I let it chill out in a pot for a few minutes to get a nice snap showing all of his pareidoliac eyes and his enormous pheromone-detecting antennae without him flapping about.

He’s back in the wild now looking for true love rather than olfactory moth porn. Neither the male nor the female has mouthparts, so they cannot eat, they get all their energy from reserves built up when they were larvae (caterpillars) eating heather or brambles. They have to get it together as soon as they can during the flight time of April to May.

Now, who said moths were grey and dowdy? This is surely the most photogenic moth in the UK.