The Moth Trance

Earlier this evening I dug out my binoculars and took them to West Bay for the first time since...er...May. To be honest I haven't missed birding at all. Well, you don't, do you? Not when you're in a moth trance. Birding buddy Steve Waite made me laugh out loud last night...

That certainly is one handsome Yellow-legged Gull. Steve's message cut through the beguiling haze of mothy distraction like a laser, and reminded me that there are other ways to bore blog readers. The recent moth trance has made me a bit one-dimensional, and I hereby promise to revisit the tried and trusted formulae of yore: gulls, dire seawatching, and gulls. And gulls.

Meanwhile, a quick mothy catch-up...

Tuesday night, 11th July

112 moths of 50 species. Four were new for year, one new for garden.

Reddish Light Arches. New for the garden, and seemingly quite scarce in West Dorset (see below).

Oak Nycteoline, the second this year.

A rather nice example of this common micro.

First Chinese Character of 2023. Absolutely pristine. My favourite 'bird poo' moth.

The Reddish Light Arches featured above was yet another moth I recognised instantly through having seen it several times on Twitter. This happens to me a lot. I already knew it was a pretty good record, but how good, exactly? This is a difficult question to answer. The only yardstick available to me is the species' Living Record map.

Living Record is the Dorset Moth Group's preferred recording facility, but its data only seem to go back a few years. In addition, the moth group's website has not been updated since 2019 for macros, and contains almost no information (and blank maps) for micros. Which means I can do little better than offer 'ball park' comments on a particular moth's status. Even so, it is pretty evident that Reddish Light Arches is a decent record...

The big yellow-centred blob by Swanage represents 63 records (Durlston Country Park is clearly a hotspot) but the small blue blobs closest to Bridport represent single records. So yes, a nice species to get in the garden trap.

To give some idea of the extent of moth trapping activity in Dorset, I thought it might be helpful to check out the Silver Y map. I guessed this would be a species that most recorders would make an effort to submit numbers for, yet that is also common...

I would imagine this map gives a rough indication of where Dorset moths encounter the most bothering. The hot blob just above West Bay represents almost 600 Silver Y records from the Bridport contingent.

Zooming in a bit...

Yep, there are a lot of moth traps in Dorset.

Wednesday night, 12th July

139 moths of 56 species, of which three new for year.

The garden's second one of these.

A nice, fresh Scalloped Oak. Number three for 2023.

A good night for pugs, with seven species. This one is White-spotted Pug...

...this one is Wormwood Pug...

...and this one is Slender Pug. Easily as much fun as gulls.

Who said micros were hard to ID? Love this one!

The vast majority (>300 this year) of this kind of moth in the trap are Chrysoteuchia culmella, and it's a case of sifting through them for this one, which is quite similar. Just five so far in 2023...

Just a handful of West Dorset records on the Living Record map, making this a decent catch. There is one Bridport dot already, but that was also from our trap. Yep, our garden is the local hotspot for this...er...sought-after stunner.

I might try a little seawatch tomorrow morning.

After processing the moth trap of course.