Regular visitors to the Sciencebase site and associated social media have probably spotted the leps (Lepidoptera, the butterflies and moths), that have somewhat usurped the previous 18 months of bird photography, although that is still ongoing.
If you haven’t, what have you been looking at, then? Anyway, I was almost set to clean up the borrowed actinic light moth trap and return it to my friend who so kindly lent it to me on 24 July and endowed me with a new addiction.
Red-green Carpet (Chloroclysta siterata)
The reason? Well, there hadn’t really been much new for a while and I was starting to believe that our garden setting is not quite good enough for the moths. I persisted, however, and having had a dearth of new species this last week was rewarded on my return from C5 the band rehearsals last night with several I had not seen before as well as some old favourites.
Lunar Underwing (Omphaloscelis lunosa)The new ones included Lunar Underwing, Red-green Carpet and Black Rustic, and the oldies, but goodies were the various Yellow Underwings (Lesser, Large, Broad-bordered), Flounced Rustic, Gold Triangle, Willow Beauty, Brimstone, Common Wainscot, Vine’s Rustic, Shuttle-shaped Dart, Sallow, and several others. You can see the 100+moths I’ve identified and photographed in my Leps gallery on Imaging Storm.
Encouragement from the mothing community, especially from Rob, Brian, Samantha, Leonard, Matthew, Karen, Mandy, Ben, Jade (who told me Lunar UW was just around the corner), Mark, and others, particularly on the UK moths Flying Tonight Facebook group. And, of course, Mrs Sciencebase who was not so keen initially, but has taken a flight of fancy of late, a lep of faith you might say.