As you may know from recent posts I’ve started moth trapping and have been part of the formation of the Ceredigion Moth Group. It’s all a little ‘geeky’ but I quite enjoy the moth trapping, as does Morgan and learning more about the creatures around us is always a good thing. Keeping records of them and submitting them to the various interested parties makes it all feel a little more worthwhile, and in a small way these activities may help with the conservation of rare species.
In some respects I would rather be actively contributing to conservation in this way than simply donating money to conservation charities. However, as well as actively taking part in moth counting and submitting results to the Big Garden Bird Watch we also spent some money recently on becoming members of the RSPB and Butterfly Conservation.
RSPB
There are a few RSPB reserves locally and we do often enjoy a short walk at the Ynyshir Reserve, so becoming a member seemed like a sensible thing to do. The membership fees obviously go towards supporting the RSPB which should be the main reason for joining, but you get quite a it for your money too. As well as free entry to their reserves you receive a Quarterly Bird magazine with plenty of interesting articles in it and junior members such as Morgan get a ‘Wild Times’ magazine six times a year, featuring the adventures of Owlbert, Rookie, Red the squirrel and Squeak the mouse. You also get free gifts if you want them and RSPB bird guide book (which I already had).
Obviously you don’t really join for these benefits, but we were pretty interested in what Morgan would get for his membership fee as it is these things that will keep him interested in the wildlife around him.
Butterfly Conservation
The Butterfly Conservation membership is similar. For your fees you receive free entry to their reserves a ‘Butterfly’ magazine three times a year, a welcome pack and a garden butterfiles ID guide, along with advice on attracting butterflies and moths to your garden
Of course, you also get a nice warm feeling at having helped the conservation effort of our wild British birds, butterflies and moths.
Both organisations have decent websites where you can join them or simply donate. They both have lots of information online, not just about the organisations themselves, but about the birds and butterflies of the UK too., so check out their websites and join up too.
The Ceredigion Moth Group is up and running and we seem to be making some progress.
I’ve set up a mailing list so that we can all keep in touch with each other and we have been sending our records from 2009 to the new County Recorder. I only had a fairly small number of records from 2009 as I didn’t start moth trapping until late in the year, but I had an e-mail back from the County Recorder saying:
Your data have now been verified without amendment, and incorporated into the VC46 County list – many thanks.
It looks as though the records I kept were worthwhile and will go towards a greater understanding of the moths that are present in the area.
So far the County Recorder has received records from 2009 that amount to more than 9000 recordings. Not all are verified/processed yet, but they have been used to make a start on a County list which is being sent to ‘Butterfly Conservation‘ to be included in the forthcoming Butterfly Conservation Atlas.
We have a meeting / workshop planned for March 27th and there is a Moth Count Event in Conwy on 13th march that I may well go to. I’m getting quite ‘into’ my moths! If only there were some to trap here at the moment.
