GMS News

Early Summer 2014

Weeks 10-18

Contents

Editorial Norman Lowe 1 Overview GMS 2014 2nd Quarter Angus Tyner 2 A Yorkshireman’s short holiday “Darn Sarf” David Baker 13 Lepidopteran Crossword 5 solution Nonconformist 15 2015 Annual Conference Norman Lowe 16 Tailpiece Norman Lowe 16 GMS sponsors 16

Editorial – Norman Lowe

As you read through this, you’ll probably find that your own experience of plenty of moths has been replicated everywhere. Warm weather, warm nights and good numbers of moths have made this a summer to blot out the memories of 2012 and 2013. Angus has once more gone into this in a lot of detail so we can pore through the numbers and graphs and pick out which species did well and perhaps some that, for whatever reason, didn’t do so well. I know that here in Wales, both White Ermine and Buff Ermine did very well and so did Flame Shoulder which seems to have done quite well throughout. By the way, did you know that Flame Shoulder is the moth that for some reason is most likely to get lodged on the ear, quite painfully, I’m told!

There has been a lot of activity behind the scenes, especially by Janet Cheney, to organise the 2015 Annual Conference, which I can now reveal will be held on 1st March at Chiltern Woodland Burial Park. More details later in this newsletter.

This quarter, apart from the usual features we have a description of a holiday in foreign parts and the moths to be found there, and we have the answers to our Crossword No. 5 – did you get all the answers? In the meantime we are nearly at the end of the Late Summer quarter so it’s time to start thinking about getting your records sent in to your Area Co-ordinator.

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Overview GMS 2014 2nd Quarter – Angus Tyner

After the very poor 2nd quarters of the past 2 years, this year’s return to usual numbers was very welcome. The first table shows that apart from the first week, numbers per trap were up and there were very few empty traps.

Next is a graph showing the average number of moths in each garden for the Early Summer Quarter for each year from 2009 and it can be seen that the numbers are about average and well up on last year and the year before.

The next table is the list of top 30 or so. Every species has showed an increase over the mean of past 3 years. This mainly due to the past 2 seasons being so poor resulting in a low mean. Compared to last year only, Hebrew Character is down because of the delayed emergence last year which meant Q2 numbers were relatively high.

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You’ll see that some species have gone up in the table such as Light Brown Apple Moth up from 12 to 5 and Small Square-spot up from 54 to 12. But as you’d expect others have gone down, Garden Grass-veneer from 5 to 111 and Dark Arches from 2 to 7, and unlike most other species this has hardly shown any increase over the average figure for the three years 2011 to 2013.

GMS 2014 2nd Quarter – 294 Gardens (core species only) (2011-13 Species (core list only) Total Mean per 2011-13 % increase Compared position) garden mean /decrease with 2013 1 (1) Heart & Dart 17767 60.4 53.5 13% 188% 2 (3) Marbled Minor agg. 3420 11.6 5.1 129% 391% 3 (6) Flame Shoulder 3353 11.4 4.4 160% 147% 4 (4) Buff Ermine 3309 11.3 5 126% 177% 5 (12) Light Brown Apple Moth 3250 11.1 3.2 246% 188% 6 (7) Flame 3145 10.7 4.2 157% 472% 7 (2) Dark Arches 3108 10.6 8.9 19% 1858% 8 (18) Common Marbled Carpet 2646 9 2.5 265% 87% 9 (14) Brimstone Moth 2613 8.9 2.7 226% 105% 10 (8) White Ermine 2514 8.6 4 116% 94% 11 (5) Garden Grass-veneer 2113 7.2 4.6 56% 483% 12 (54) Small Square-spot 1854 6.3 0.7 775% 320% 13 (20) Bright-line Brown-eye 1769 6 2.2 174% 182% 14 (19) Hebrew Character 1735 5.9 2.3 159% -14% 15 (15) Silver-ground Carpet 1674 5.7 2.7 114% 144% 16 (17) Riband Wave 1582 5.4 2.5 112% 963% 17 (9) Shuttle-shaped Dart 1576 5.4 3.8 40% 215% 18 (16) Ingrailed Clay 1419 4.8 2.6 83% 217% 19 (22) Willow Beauty 1335 4.5 2.1 120% 423% 20 (11) Large Yellow Underwing 1324 4.5 3.4 33% 129% 21 (27) Clouded-bordered Brindle 1225 4.2 1.6 167% 150% 22 (34) Elephant Hawk-moth 1188 4 1.3 214% 181% 23 (35) Small Magpie 1167 4 1.2 220% 201% 24 (33) Peppered Moth 1136 3.9 1.3 196% 95% 25 (29) Mottled Beauty 1126 3.8 1.4 174% 875% 26 (26) Double Square-spot 1026 3.5 1.6 123% 825% 27 (38) Garden Carpet 1015 3.5 1.2 194% 37% 28 (30) Scalloped Hazel 992 3.4 1.4 149% 69% 29 (41) Clouded Silver 968 3.3 1 229% 127% 30 (25) Common Footman 962 3.3 1.6 108% 8105% 31 (36) Middle-barred Minor 886 3 1.2 146% 126% 32 (40) Bee Moth 857 2.9 1.1 163% 223% 33 (60) Buff-tip 846 2.9 0.5 427% 277% 34 (24) Rustic Shoulder-knot 832 2.8 1.8 61% 61%

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Abundance by region

The next table breaks down this top 30 or so into regional values. The figures represent the mean number of moths per garden. The abbreviation for the regions are listed here.

NW North West England SC Scotland NE North East England IR Ireland YH Yorkshire & Humberside EE East England WA Wales WM West Midlands EM East Midlands SW South West England SE South East England NW SC NE IR YH EE WA WM EM SW SE No. of Gardens, Total 294 36 15 11 23 12 17 30 30 29 40 51 Heart & Dart 36.8 8.1 22.6 33.2 15.3 124.9 41.4 44.1 73.3 94.4 62.9 Marbled Minor agg 8.4 3.7 0.0 5.0 6.6 19.1 5.0 9.4 17.2 16.7 12.5 Flame Shoulder 10.4 4.8 2.1 12.5 7.6 8.9 17.1 7.8 7.8 17.3 6.3 Buff Ermine 12.6 0.0 5.8 11.4 8.9 6.8 18.6 7.6 8.4 15.1 4.4 Light Brown Apple Moth 4.9 0.5 9.0 10.5 8.5 9.2 4.3 14.3 12.8 11.5 17.6 Flame 9.9 1.1 2.5 3.4 2.1 12.9 11.5 10.4 14.4 17.6 5.5 Dark Arches 6.3 2.9 3.1 2.6 3.0 27.1 8.5 4.4 10.9 12.7 15.8 Common Marbled Carpet 7.5 3.4 4.6 8.3 2.4 4.6 7.6 10.5 9.7 12.1 7.8 Brimstone Moth 6.8 10.1 5.7 13.6 10.0 4.7 8.1 7.6 12.7 6.8 5.6 White Ermine 3.6 6.4 4.2 29.0 5.3 3.6 22.2 2.2 3.4 7.3 3.9 Garden Grass-veneer 2.9 1.8 2.1 1.7 0.8 15.8 4.6 3.0 7.7 7.9 15.0 Small Square-spot 4.8 1.8 0.9 22.0 10.0 2.9 3.5 3.5 3.4 10.1 1.7 Bright-line Brown-eye 4.6 1.7 1.1 5.0 2.9 6.2 4.4 6.5 9.8 7.3 4.7 Hebrew Character 5.3 8.8 2.9 12.1 1.9 2.4 14.2 1.8 1.7 7.3 0.6 Silver-ground Carpet 7.7 11.3 15.1 7.0 8.0 0.4 8.6 2.1 2.4 2.7 0.4 Riband Wave 3.5 0.2 0.5 3.0 2.2 5.9 3.6 5.4 6.8 8.0 6.7 Shuttle-shaped Dart 4.0 0.0 0.4 0.0 2.4 14.9 1.2 4.8 3.9 7.1 8.3 Ingrailed Clay 9.4 0.1 0.5 4.6 4.1 0.3 3.0 3.9 3.3 3.5 2.6 Willow Beauty 2.9 0.3 1.6 2.5 0.6 5.6 2.3 4.9 5.8 5.3 6.9 Large Yellow Underwing 3.6 1.7 1.7 4.5 1.3 5.4 4.2 2.8 3.1 6.1 5.2 Clouded-bordered Brindle 6.8 10.2 0.0 7.8 3.0 0.7 4.5 1.1 3.2 1.9 0.3 Elephant Hawk-moth 2.2 1.5 0.5 8.4 3.2 5.7 5.5 2.6 4.5 4.7 2.2 Small Magpie 2.3 0.3 1.2 1.5 2.3 3.6 2.9 5.5 6.0 4.8 4.7 Peppered Moth (All forms) 2.9 3.8 1.5 5.9 1.3 2.2 5.3 3.9 2.9 3.8 3.0 Mottled Beauty 2.8 2.3 1.4 10.0 1.6 2.0 6.8 2.2 2.0 1.7 3.9 Double Square-spot 4.1 2.6 3.5 1.3 3.8 6.5 3.0 2.4 3.2 3.1 1.8 Garden Carpet 3.0 3.3 4.5 2.3 3.3 3.1 1.7 3.4 5.9 3.1 2.2 Scalloped Hazel 3.1 3.1 3.2 4.7 3.6 1.3 3.7 5.3 4.6 1.9 0.7 Clouded Silver 2.4 1.9 0.7 4.5 0.8 3.0 3.2 2.8 5.2 3.7 2.2 Common Footman 2.6 0.0 0.1 0.0 2.8 11.4 0.7 3.4 5.9 1.1 4.1 Middle-barred Minor 2.2 2.5 0.0 1.7 4.3 1.3 2.4 5.9 5.2 2.5 1.7 Bee Moth 2.6 0.5 1.8 0.9 2.7 3.9 1.2 2.5 5.0 1.3 4.2 Buff-tip 1.4 0.9 0.3 4.6 0.5 2.8 6.4 2.0 1.3 3.8 2.5 Rustic Shoulder-knot 0.9 2.5 0.0 1.1 4.0 3.7 0.1 1.5 12.8 1.5 2.1

The figure for the region with the highest abundance is given in red and that for the lowest in blue. For some species the numbers vary more than others – Heart & Dart varies between

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124.9 in East England and 8.1 in Scotland and Small Square-spot between 22 in Ireland and 0.9 in NE England. On the other hand Brimstone Moth is much more consistent throughout with a maximum of 13.6 in Ireland and a minimum of 4.7 in Eastern England.

Regional Top 10

The next table contains the regional top 10 which includes non-core species.

North West Mean Scotland Mean North East Mean Heart and Dart 36.8 Silver-ground Carpet 11.3 Heart & Dart 22.6 Buff Ermine 12.6 Clouded-bordered Brindle 10.2 Silver-ground Carpet 15.1 Flame Shoulder 10.4 Brimstone Moth 10.1 Light Brown Apple Moth 9 Flame 9.9 Beautiful Golden Y 8.9 Buff Ermine 5.8 Ingrailed Clay 9.4 Hebrew Character 8.8 Brimstone Moth 5.7 Marbled Minor agg. 8.4 Heart & Dart 8.1 Common Marbled Carpet 4.6 Silver-ground Carpet 7.7 Pale-shouldered Brocade 6.5 Map-winged Swift 4.5 Common Marbled Carpet 7.5 White Ermine 6.4 Garden Carpet 4.5 Clouded-bordered Brindle 6.8 Flame Shoulder 4.8 White Ermine 4.2 Brimstone Moth 6.8 Common Quaker 4.5 Double Square-spot 3.5 Ireland Mean Yorkshire & Humber Mean East England Mean Heart and Dart 33.2 Heart and Dart 15.3 Heart and Dart 124.9 White Ermine 29 Brimstone Moth 10 Dark Arches 27.1 Small Square-spot 22 Small Square-spot 10 Uncertain 22.6 Brimstone Moth 13.6 Buff Ermine 8.9 Treble Lines 19.3 Flame Shoulder 12.5 Light Brown Apple Moth 8.5 Marbled Minor agg. 19.1 Hebrew Character 12.1 Silver-ground Carpet 8 Garden Grass-veneer 15.8 Buff Ermine 11.4 Flame Shoulder 7.6 Shuttle-shaped Dart 14.9 Light Brown Apple Moth 10.5 Marbled Minor agg. 6.6 Flame 12.9 Mottled Beauty 10 White Ermine 5.3 Common Footman 11.4 Beautiful Golden Y 9.4 Straw Dot 5 Mottled Rustic 10.5 Wales Mean West Midlands Mean East Midlands Mean Heart and Dart 41.4 Heart and Dart 44.1 Heart and Dart 73.3 White Ermine 22.2 Light Brown Apple Moth 14.3 Marbled Minor agg. 17.2 Buff Ermine 18.6 Common Marbled Carpet 10.5 Flame 14.4 Flame Shoulder 17.1 Flame 10.4 Light Brown Apple Moth 12.8 Hebrew Character 14.2 Marbled Minor agg. 9.4 Rustic Shoulder-knot 12.8 Flame 11.5 Flame Shoulder 7.8 Brimstone Moth 12.7 Silver-ground Carpet 8.6 Buff Ermine 7.6 Dark Arches 10.9 Dark Arches 8.5 Brimstone Moth 7.6 Bright-line Brown-eye 9.8 Brimstone Moth 8.1 Bright-line Brown-eye 6.5 Common Marbled Carpet 9.7 Common Marbled Carpet 7.6 Middle-barred Minor 5.9 Buff Ermine 8.4 South West Mean South East Mean Heart and Dart 94.4 Heart and Dart 62.9 Flame 17.6 Heart and Club 20.2 Flame Shoulder 17.3 Light Brown Apple Moth 17.6 Marbled Minor agg. 16.7 Dark Arches 15.8 Buff Ermine 15.1 Garden Grass-veneer 15 Uncertain/Rustic agg. 14.2 Uncertain 13.8 Dark Arches 12.7 Treble Lines 12.7 Common Marbled Carpet 12.1 Marbled Minor agg. 12.5 Light Brown Apple Moth 11.5 Shoulder-striped Wainscot 8.9

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Weeks 1-18 (quarter 1 & quarter 2) graphs

This series of graphs give the regional figures for average numbers per garden and total species recorded in each week in each region. The larger the number of gardens, the larger the species diversity. Also some regions have larger species lists, so a direct comparison cannot be made between regions. The numbers of gardens per region are mentioned in the previous table.

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A Yorkshireman’s short holiday “Darn Sarf” by David Baker

This year my better half decided to allow me to take a moth trap on our holidays and we travelled to Dorset for a six day break. We booked into self-catering accommodation, recommended by a local friend, at the beautifully named Creech Bottom, at the back side of Wareham. The owner was very agreeable to me running a moth trap in the garden and told me that several others had done the same thing over the years. Considering that “Southerners” get around one thousand additional species in their warmer climes I did hope to increase my personal count by seeing at least a few new species in somebody else’s garden. We arrived mid-afternoon, very tired and, after settling ourselves in, we looked around the garden area with the site owner and agreed to place my MV trap on the “rough open ground” boundary of the property about four feet from a huge stand of bamboo in the next door neighbour’s garden.

And so to bed, with timer set, dreaming of a wonderful catch. The real catch, however, was that on waking early I went out to check the trap and there it was, GONE !! It turned out that the position chosen was one foot inside the neighbour’s boundary and he had disconnected it and put it in his summer house. His comment was that “children could have burnt themselves on the bulb”. This was at 10 o’clock at night and I still have difficulty in knowing how the light showed through the “bamboo jungle”! Funny folk, these Southerners!

On the second night, with humble pie duly eaten and the trap recovered, things were a bit more successful. My “umpteenth” birthday dawned and by 0600 hrs I was emptying the newly positioned trap. Of course, many species were well known to me but I was very taken by my first sighting of a Privet Hawk-moth, closely followed by Brussels Lace. A nice birthday present! The Hawk-moth seemed to be very large but it checked out well against Richard Lewington’s illustrations; so much for my powers of observation. I was also surprised at finding 5 specimens of Marbled White Spot in this first catch, a number which was increased to 19 the following day. I find only the odd one every now and again at home.

On day three, as the owners had left for a couple of days to visit their family, I took the opportunity to use my 15 watt actinic trap in their courtyard. This resulted in the visit of Clouded Buff and True-lover’s Knot, presumably from the nearby facing moorland area.

Clouded Buff True-lover’s Knot

Although I had seen them both in our Yorkshire moorland sites they are not regular visitors to my semi-urban trap. One of the first moths spotted within the main MV trap on that morning was a real “little brown job”, but what a catch for me. The lovely, but small, Festoon

13 was accompanied by 4 similar dainty geometers which certainly needed the use of my field guide. They turned out to be Small Seraphim, seemingly common enough in the area.

Festoon Small Seraphim

Also deeper in the trap was one of the “Peacock”s, determined later in the day during a discussion with a Butterfly Conservation friend as being the Sharp-angled Peacock. With regard to the alternative, the Peacock Moth, something to do with rarity and rocking-horses was quoted. Deeper still and a real turn-up for me was a moth I had never expected to see. Surely we all have this feeling about some moths which hold our attention but seem so remote. The moth in question was a single Lobster Moth, which was surprising docile and well mannered whilst I photographed it on an adjacent tree trunk. So with plenty of specimens recorded on a very warm early morning things were tidied up for the next evening’s attempt.

Sharp-angled Peacock Lobster Moth

On day four along with the afore-mentioned 19 Marbled White Spots were another 51 species of macro, not all new of course. A beautiful Rosy Footman escaped whilst trying to photograph it, but it was so distinctive and recognisable, but now only a memory. 3 more Lobsters then greeted me along with 4 Beautiful Hook-tips and 6 Scarce Footman. Both these moths were new to me at home, but only as singletons, during the previous summer of 2013, and it was nice to see them in good numbers. While photographing what I thought was a Clay I noted the slightly different markings and the books showed it to be a White Point.

At the end of that day we had cracking storm conditions and quickly lowering temperatures and the trap was put out on a slightly damp evening. The mornings count was certainly lower, only 11 species of macro but still surprises were received. What looked, at first, like 3 Single-dotted Waves turned out to be only 1 along with 2 Treble Brown Spots. Not a big

14 difference to us but, no doubt, important to them! That final count of the holiday also included another newcomer which, oddly enough, I also found in the Wood of Cree area of Scotland some 13 days later. It may well have been the crowning glory of the trip, aptly named the Coronet.

White Point Coronet

So, was it a good trip? Well decidedly so, with 103 species of moth recorded, 3 new micros and 9 new macros. Not many of the 1000 or so to be found in the warmer south but in 4 nights trapping it was a good start.

Lepidopteran Crossword Solution No. 5 by Nonconformist

B E A U T I F U L H O O K T I P E L R W E O L R I V Y A R C T I I N A E E C U N E C T N F E A T H E R E D K N O T W A L L N O H L N R O E I N D I C A A A E N N O M O S N E O W D C I I T I G E R L A C K E Y K S S I I A H G S V A D O T T E D C E E T A I N I A E V A S M A L L R A R B R O O M P N L I S K Y O P O T A P A M E A M A N Y I T L X A O T H E R A T M O R M O M O O N E R I N R L D M A G P I E L I N E D

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Annual Conference 2015

Here’s a date for you to put in your diaries for next year. The GMS Annual Conference will be held on 1st March 2015 at Chiltern Woodland Burial Park, Potkiln Lane, Beaconsfield, Bucks HP9 2XB. We are still working on the detailed programme, so if you’d like to contribute, please let me know. However we’ll certainly have the usual mixture of reports from 2014 and a look forward to 2015 and beyond. We also hope to have a range of stalls including Atropos Books and Izumi Segawa who tells me that she has extended her range of badges and jewellery.

Tailpiece

And finally… my usual request for any feedback – what you liked, what you might like to see changed and especially any contribution on moth-related subjects. I’d very much like to have contributions from all parts of the British Isles. So if you have anything for me, just get in touch at [email protected]

GMS Sponsors

We were very thankful for the financial assistance from the following organisations; please consider using our sponsors for any purchases you need to make!

Atropos Books Online book store and publication of Atropos, the journal for butterfly, moth and dragonfly enthusiasts. Special offers available on the website. www.atroposbooks.co.uk The Boat House, Church Cove, Lizard, Cornwall, TR12 7PH 01326 290287 [email protected]

Focus Optics Moth trapping equipment, binoculars, telescopes and much more. www.focusoptics.eu Church Lane, Corley, Coventry, CV7 8BA 01676 542476/540501 [email protected]

MapMate is a biological recording system designed for enthusiasts to record, map, analyse and share their natural history sightings. It was originally developed for moth recording and has now expanded to include most of the UK fauna and flora. It is being used by some 20,000 individuals and institutions in the UK including very large groups like the RSPB and the Botanical Society of the British Isles. www.mapmate.co.uk

Like us on Facebook!

The GMS has its own Facebook page where you can post comments, check out what people are seeing across the country, and generally keep in touch with like-minded moth enthusiasts. https://www.facebook.com/GardenMothScheme

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