WINE RACE 2016 .. MATTc380 .. TRENT 353 .. BEN 347 ...... Garden species:- Macros 357, Micros 365, Total 722

Thursday 24 February 2011

23rd Feb... Surprisingly early

What a difference a few degrees make !
Temperature stayed around 9 deg C until after midnight before dipping to 6 deg.
An Early Grey was a month earlier than last year (25th March) and a Dark Chestnut was on the shed near the blacklights. My second March Moth joined my third Oak Beauty after 3 Tortricodes alternella and an Agonopterix heracliana had been listed.
Best night of the year so far and tonight (24th) looks to be promising.
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EARLY GREY 2243



DARK CHESTNUT 2259 Evenings tally :-
3 x Tortricodes alternella 1025
Agonopterix heracliana 688
Dark Chestnut 2259
Oak Beauty 1930
March Moth 1663
Early Grey *FFY 2243
Garden Tally :-
35 moths of 15 species ( 10 macro, 5 micro )
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New Site now being monitored. HOLME WOOD, Northill, Bedfordshire.
Son and Dad have joined forces to monitor this site on a "once a month" basis.
Matt "Ratface" Burgess has designed a foldaway portable trap with seperate clip-on twin 15 watt tubes and yours truly has wired the inverters and lampholders to a weatherproof box. ( After first crossing over the lampholders and burning out a tenners worth of tubes during testing !)
We set it up at Holme Wood for its first outing last night and I went there at "sparrow fart" this morning to check the contents .
Full report will appear on Matts blog in the near future along with some pics of the moths , trap and site.
Not a bad first outing. Obviously all year firsts :-
7 x Small Brindled Beauty
5 x Dotted Border
5 x March Moth
2 x Tortricodes alternella
1 x Pale Brindled Beauty
1 x Hebrew Character
1 x Engrailed spp.
1 x Spring Usher
1 x Clouded Drab
24 Moths for 9 species.
Next outing will be sometime in March
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A worker bee was seen for the first time this year in Matts garden this morning.......................

........................and it was nice to see the first Primrose in flower in Holme Wood.


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How many times have you seen one of these on the wall at night and thought it was a moth ?
Yeah, me too !





A Marbled Beauty "catty" munching on the lichen on my wall last night






Plenty of Seven-spot ladybirds about.







" There's a killer on the road"......Lyrics from a famous song by The Doors....this particular killer was on the wall above the doors









Who saw the film "The Fly" ?
This one looks like Brundle









3 comments:

  1. 24 moths of 9 species! You've missed the Pale Brindled Beauty.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good going, yes it seems early for a lot of species this year so far!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ben....I seem to be a month early on species caught so far this year.
    Matt.... I've added the PBB and altered the tally

    ReplyDelete