Moth Night |
Will testing my net out |
Success! |
Lime Hawk-moth |
Brown Silver-lines |
The most numerous moth of the night were brown silver-lines. It is simply a brown moth with two central silvery lines across it's middle and with a small dot between them. When it is at rest, the wings close up and the moth's appearance becomes more triangular. It is a moth of heathlands and it's caterpillars feed on bracken.
Brimstone |
One moth I can identify without much difficulty is this one. Brimstone moths are bright yellow with brown markings along the edges of the wings. They are extremely common and you can't really mistake it for anything else.
Common Swift |
Light Emerald |
The light emerald moth is another of those species that are easy enough to pick out of the moth crowd. This is a pale light green moth with a couple of pale white stripes across the middle of the wings.
Spectacled Moth |
Spectacled moths are so called because of the grey markings at the front of the thorax looks like it's wearing a pair of spectacles. Other than that, they are brown-grey with a dark centre with spots and stripes that, to me, resembles an owl's face if you look at it this way round.
Top view of a Spectacled Moth |
Pale Tussock |
Pale Tussock with wings open |
Alder Moth |
Heart and Dart |
Heart and dart moths are one of the most common visitors to any moth trap. It is named after the heart-shaped splodges on it's wings with the two dark lines above them resembling darts. Fairly simple, but be warned, these moths vary in colour with some being darker or lighter than others, but the pattern remains the same.
Treble Lines |
This moth is called a treble lines. This is another moth that is named after it's appearance, which makes things easier for me to remember. It is usually this pale brown colour (though it can be darker) with three thin lines across the wings. They appear from May until early July.
Pale Oak Beauty |
I think these two moths are mottled beauties. I am not completely sure, but they are definitely from the Geometridae family (that's the scientific name for moths that have wide wings with geometric patterns). There are many similar looking species in this family, that it can be very hard to tell them apart. I believe these are mottled beauties because the pattern kind of matches the ones pictured in my ID books. [Edit: Apparently, these were pale oak beauties, which were new to the site.]
Meadow Grey micro moth (I think) |
Finally is this micro moth, which is a meadow grey. At least that's what I've been told it was. Micro moths are very tiny moths. Most of them look very similar to one another. And worst of all, there are hundreds more species to choose from compared to the bigger moths that I have been focusing on up until now. I think I'll leave these micro moths to the experts, I'm having difficulty remembering the names of the bigger ones as it is.
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