Contents of a Soggy Moth Trap

I haven’t had the moth trap out this week as it has been too wet and windy. We did trap on Friday night in the hills above Talybont, and as I don’t want to miss too much I put the trap out last night despite the forecast of rain.

I went out to the trap after dark. The wind had dropped and there was loads of activity so it was looking good for a decent catch in the morning. However, the forecast was for more wind and then rain from about 3am onwards. The forecast was spot on at 3am the wind filled in from the SW and was soon up to 20 knots, The rain started in earnest too so I got out of bed and put the trap under a chair to shelter it a bit.

I was back up at 6.30am when the rain was really heavy and brought the trap in. I then had to wait for Morgan to wake up before I could investigate its contents, which we did together. Once again it was a fairly good catch with 94 moths and over 30 species.

Here’s the list.

• 2 x Swallow-tailed Moth
• 2 x Lackey
• 20 x Dark Arches
• 1 x Least Yellow Underwing*
• 2 x Willow Beauty
• 2 x Flame Shoulder
• 3 x Shuttle-shaped Dart
• 4 x Flame
• 2 x Elephant Hawkmoth
• 5 x Garden Tiger
• 2 x Middle-barred Minor
• 6 x Common Rustic / Lesser Common Rustic agg.
• 1 x Clouded Border*
• 10 x Large Yellow Underwing
• 2 x Bright-line Brown-eye
• 4 x Smoky Wainscot
• 2 x Buff Ermine
• 3 x Riband Wave
• 1 x Heart and Dart
• 1 x Drinker
• 1 x Yellow Shell
• 1 x Oligia sp.
• 2 x True Lover’s Knot
• 1 x Peppered Moth*
• 1 x Common Wainscot
• 1 x Clay
• 3 x July Highflyer
• 2 x Rustic
• 1 x Antler Moth
• 1 x Uncertain
• 1 x Dark / Grey Dagger agg.
• 1 x Fan-foot*
• 1 x Yellow-tail*
• 1x Coast Dart*

I haven’t got photos of all of the new ones yet. The Fan-foot escaped before I could get a photo and I’m still waiting to calm the Yellow-tail and Clouded Border before getting a shot. Here are some of the other new ones though and I’ll post the other later when / if I get a decent shot of them.

Tags: Moth Trapping