Moth season begins

Despite having found a fair few moths, including new ones, this year on the reserve, things are starting to look up in terms of diversity. The Nut-tree Tussock is new for the reserve.

Small Phoenix

Nut-tree Tussock

Lunar Thorn

Rustic Shoulder-knot

300 lepidoptera!

So the 300th species of Lepidoptera was recorded at Cullaloe on the 29th, and it was this beautiful Streamer (1 of 2 so it could have been the other one)

This is the 282nd species of moth as there are 18 butterflies on the list. Hopefully by the end of the year we'll also have the 300th moth!

Pussy Willow

The large willow in the car par has been providing lots of entertainment with its profusion of catkins in flower. During the day the hum of honey bees is pretty loud. Maybe someone close has a hive. Bombus terrstris and Andrena Clarkella are the only other bees I've seen at it so far. The golden dung fly Scathophaga stercoraria is also a big fan as well as pollen beetles as-yet-unidentified.

Two species of Egle - anthomyid flies, or flower flies - have been caught so far = E.ciliata and E.minuta.

Last night, though, it was the turn of the nocturnal visitors...

Dotted Border

Common Quaker

Mottled Grey

Hebrew Character

Rhigognostis incarnatella

Even at only 5 degrees it was pretty busy, with the Rhigognostis incarnatella (Scothc Smudge) being new to the reserve and only added to the county list in 2016.

Chocolate Moth

After a disaster with a petrol-deficient generator we abandoned moth trapping early last night after only catching one macro moth - a Water Carpet. Even that was caught with the headtorch. But with open skies and a bright moon we were always up against it anyway. This is the chocolate form of Water Carpet and, as is traditional, it was caught down near the filter beds.

200 lepidoptera!

Two new moth species from an early session last night took the reserve list to 200, including butterflies. Hopefully the 200 moth total will soon be reached. New ones were Mottled Grey and Yellow Horned (also new for NT18). This takes the new species for this year to 57, and the total species to 1363. 137 to go!

Blushing bracket, Rosy Minor

Everything's coming up rosy these days

The blushing bracket, which likes willows, bruises pink and eventually becomes an outrageous red colour

This rosy minor was new for the reserve on 1st September. Pretty little thing.

Painted Lady

At long last the much vaunted arrival of .. one Painted Lady!. Well, one's better than none. Maybe there are more out there today with the sun continuing to shine

Weekend Orange tip

Mudwort and Canary-shouldered Thorn

Finally with the water levels remaining lowered a bit I wandered around the far side to check for Mudwort (Limosella aquatica). The mud hasn't been exposed for long and there are only a few signs of its presence. Here it is:

Spectacular isn't it? Even more so when the flowers come (you will have to use a search engine of your choice to see for the moment).

More spectacular is this Canary-shouldered Thorn, one of two caught on the 20th

Red admiral

Additions of late may have been a bit composed of something for the connoisseur. This isn't a new addition for the year, but it is the first one I've photographed - a nice collection of at least 3 Red Admirals were present on Friday 22nd. Devil's-bit Scabious is a fantastic flower for all sorts of insects!

Saturday Night Moths

Dropped the trap off at Cullaloe on Saturday night after a day of rain and picked it up in the morning, producing two new species amongst a small collection - Pebble Prominent and Early Thorn (2nd gen presumably). Whilte new for the year, curiously both Pebble Prominent and Early Thorn were recorded on the same night in May 2010!

Pebble Prominent

Pebble Prominent

Early Thorn

July Highflyer

Lesser YU

Chevron

Small Phoenix

A big weekend!

A big weekend at Cullaloe with Saturday seeing grassland monitoring plus a moth trapping event. Finally the 75th bird species of the year made it onto the list with a Kingfisher fishing near the sluice gate (it was also seen on Sunday).

The grassland site monitoring produced a couple of known species which hadn't been recorded this year - Greater Birdsfoot Trefoil (which I'm never sure how to spell) and Devil's-bit Scabious. False Oat-grass was also added, although I thought I already had!

A couple of hoverflies also made it onto the list from Friday after being keyed out over the weekend, and the moth night, despite being hampered by rain, turned in a monster result with double figures of new species. All that leaves a species total of 561 (list).

Rate of species addition to year list

Grassland monitoring

Unrecorded sedge that requires further investigation

Devil's-bit Scabious

Light Arches moth

Lempke's Gold Spot

Swallow Prominent

Moth Mayhem

A foggy night at Cullaloe on the 19th saw a bumper moth crop including 11 new species for the year. Whole story is here.

Pick of the bunch is this Blue-bordered Carpet, which is also new to the hectad. Below is one of my favourite moths, the Peppered Moth.

Blue-bordered Carpet (erm .. nope - Pretty Pinion)

Peppered Moth

Double Square-spot, Large Yellow Underwing

Trapping last night yielded the above two new ones for me at Cullaloe and for the year. There's also a micro which will probably add another.

full story
 

Double Square-spot

  

Large Yellow Underwing

Large Yellow Underwing

Weekend 28-29 June

Put out the moth trap and did a bit of hoverfly searching over the weekend. Moth trap did its part by turning up four new ones (maybe 5 - let's see!) and hoverfly netting turned up only already recorded species, except possibly one soldier beetle I still have to key out. I have also found Square-stalked Saint-John's Wort in a few places.

The mushroom turned out to be Amanita rubescens, which turned a lovely shade of pink on exposed surfaces when cut.

I also swept and keyed out the hoverfly Platycheirus granditarsis.

This leaves the current total at 497, without the soldier beetle, or the fungus on Aspen leaves, or the pondweed in the filter beds I just remembered, or the Willowherb there too ... looks like I might just make that 500 in the first half of the year!

New moths added:

Dark Arches

July Highflyer

Shoulder-striped Wainscot

Pandemis heparana