Dorset Moth Diary - May ’08

e-mail: moths@littlesnails.com

Location of Moth Trap: Rainbarrow Cottage, Worth Matravers, Dorset - Grid reference SY 972 773.
The locations of other sightings as in text.

The cottage is located on a south facing hillside about 1 km from the sea. There were a couple of other cottages close by but beyond them the countryside was predominantly limestone grassland with Blackthorn scrub, woodland of Sycamore and Oak occupied sheltered areas and the lower reaches of the nearby valley.

Enjoying the holiday weather. It’s important to examine everything.

The weather for the week was, on the whole, pretty poor. It started well enough but for the first couple of days a strong easterly or north-easterly wind blew to be replaced later in the week by an equally blowy westerly. It rained heavily on the middle three nights leaving the trap and its contents pretty well drenched each morning.

In general the catches each night were interesting with one or two species turning up which I presume we’re highly unlikely to see in Lindfield, most notably Light Feathered Rustic and Light Brocade. The only other moths we caught in the trap that were entirely new to us were Cream-spot Tiger and a Rustic Shoulder-knot (though I’m not absolutely sure of the latter’s identity). After the first night’s catch I think that with more clement weather we might have had plenty more interesting species, the fact that there were four White-point and a Diamond-back Moth rather implied that there was a degree of migrant activity going on but this rather tailed off as the week went on. I also found myself slightly more than momentarily stumped on Tuesday morning by what in the end turned out to be a Treble Lines of what I presume is f. obscura.

Because the weather wasn’t that great we didn’t see very many butterflies when we were out and about (except for Thursday that is) but when the sun did shine we saw a few. On a visit to "Monkey World" (a bit one dimensional to say the least) my highlight, on what was a gloomy old day weather-wise, was the Birch Mocha I spotted on the trunk of a Silver Birch in the Lemur enclosure, cheered me up no end and for me and, to a lesser extent, Lucas made the whole trip worthwhile. I think Jo would have needed to see something a little more spectacular for her to be able to say the same and Phoebe was entirely happy with just seeing lots of monkeys.

Wall, Corfe Castle, Sunday. Common Blue, Durlston Country Park, Thursday.
Lysandra bellargus

Adonis Blue, Durlston Country Park, Thursday. Adonis Blues, Durlston Country Park, Thursday.
Erynnis tages

Dingy Skipper, Durlston Country Park, Thursday. Small Purple-barred, Durlston Country Park, Thursday.

On one local walk we took, down to Winspit and the coast, we lost count of the number of Common Nettle-tap we saw, but there were also plenty of Speckled Woods, Small and Large Whites and a couple of Orange-tip but little else. On the Thursday Lucas and I spent an hour and a half wandering around Durlston Country Park with considerably more success. The weather was fine, though at first our sightings were limited to various caterpillars, it wasn’t until we came away from the coast that we found an area of grassland on a relatively steep slope that was positively teeming with life. We first saw a Speckled Wood and then a Small Copper but shortly after that the place became alive with Adonis and Common Blues as well as Dingy Skippers and a lot of what I guessed at the time was a species of Pyrausta though I’m not sure which. I only managed an irritatingly poor photo of one, which was the case with more or less everything else we saw that day, but time was pressing as we had to go and meet up with Jo and Phoebe so we couldn’t hang around too long.

I’m now glad to be able to report that the all seeing eye of Prof. Bayley has spotted my supposed Pyrausta photo and he has pointed out to me that it is in fact a photo of Small Purple-barred, a noctuid and not a Pyrausta at all. I have to admit that it hadn’t even begun to occur to me that it might be anything other than a pyralid, let alone a noctuid (in taxonomic terms that represents a separation of more than 1000 species! - it’s difficult to be more wrong, but rest assured I’ll manage it sometime).