Thursday 13 August 2015

Moth Blog from the 22nd July to 12th August

I’ve been a bit of a slacker recently and there’s been a fairly large gap since my last blog.   In my own defense, this was at least in part due to vacations and some very nasty thunderstorms.  Anyway, here’s a quick summary of how the backyard mothing has been going.  I’ve been getting between 16 and 26 macro moth species overnight.  The actual number is somewhat higher as I do not include unidentified or unidentifiable (without dissection) species.

During this period (22nd July-12th Aug) there were 2 are new macro moth species and another 18 that were new for the year.  Thanks to Gary Anweiler for confirming the identification of the Colorful Zale Moth (Zale minerea), which apparently, is quite a late sighting (it was in my bait trap on the 24th July).
Here’s the list.  New species have an * against them.  The others are just new for this year.

*Colorful Zale Moth (Zale minerea)
*Old Man Dart Moth (Agrotis vetusta)
Sulphur Wave (Hesperumia sulphuraria)   
White Underwing (Catocala relicta)   
Semirelict Underwing Moth (Catocala semirelicta)
Charming Underwing Moth (Catocala blandula)
Two-spotted Looper (Autographa bimaculata)
White-streaked Looper (Plusia venusta)
Narrow-winged Borer (Photedes defecta)
Brachylomia populi
Thinker Moth (Lacinipolia meditata)
Brown Arches Moth (Lacinipolia stricta)
Bronzed Cutworm Moth (Nephelodes minians)
Euxoa tristicula
Sordid Dart (Euxoa adumbrata)
Euxoa ochrogaster
Obelisk Dart (Euxoa obeliscoides)
Black Army Cutworm (Actebia fennica)
Green Arches (Anaplectoides prasina)
Two-spot Dart (Protolampra rufipectus)

My total for identified backyard macro moth species in 2015 is now 136 which is already 3 better than last year, although, in 2012 I had 201 species!  My all-time backyard list is now at 297.  Maybe I will get to 300 this year??

The two part golden stigma on the Two-spotted Looper (Autographa bimaculata) were very impressive.  I hope the photograph does it justice.  I plan to include a few more photographs from the above period in future blogs.

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