Garden Update plus last moth trapping session

Bird-wise the garden is dominated by juveniles at the moment. The feeders, which I am refilling every couple of days, are constantly visited by juvenile blue tits (saw 6 the other day at the same time and desperately hoping some are those raised in our nestbox), great tits, greenfinches, goldfinches, chaffinches. Juvenile dunnocks and house sparrows are eating the food that drops below the feeders and I have seen the robin feeding two fledglings.

The main butterflies to be seen in the garden at the moment are small and large whites plus speckled woods. We get a lot of speckled woods in the garden and I have been watching pairs of males partaking in their spiralling territorial flight. I saw my first garden red admiral last week. So far this year I have seen seven species of butterfly in the garden - speckled wood, orange tip, holly blue, brimstone, small white, large white and red admiral.

I ran my moth trap last Friday evening. It was the biggest catch of the year so far. The moths were very flighty and a lot escaped as I tried to "pot" them. I let most of the micros go as they are notoriously hard to identify and I was also running out of pots! Caught my first swallowtail moths of the year. These are beautiful lemon moths looking more like butterflies than moths. I also trapped my first yellow underwing - these are very pretty with their yellow hindwing but are a nightmare to identify as there is not just one species of yellow underwing but several all looking superficially very similar i.e. large yellow underwing, lunar yellow underwing, lesser yellow underwing, broad-bordered yellow underwing, langmaid's yellow underwing, lesser broad-bordered yellow underwing and least yellow underwing. I am sure you get the picture and can imagine what its like when you get dozens to identify and as for trying to identify them when they are well worn well lets just not go there!!

Catch report below followed by some heavily cropped photos.

Catch Report - Friday, 2nd July.

Actinic skinner 15w trap

Trapped 9.45 p.m. till dawn. Minimum temperature 11.3

3 x Swallowtail Moth (new for year)
14 x Heart and Dart
2 x Small Magpie(micro moth)
1 x Common Footman (Garden tick)
4 x Riband Wave (Garden tick)
1 x Scalloped Oak (Garden tick)
4 x Flame
1 x Emmelina Monodactyla (micro)
1 x Common Marbled Carpet
1 x Setaceous Hebrew Character
1 x Common Wainscott (new for year)
1 x Knot Grass? (Garden Tick)
3 x Rustic (Garden Tick)
2 x Uncertain (Garden tick)
2 x Mottled Rustic (Garden tick)
1 x Common Carpet (Garden tick)
1 x Foxglove Pug (Garden tick)
1 x Large Yellow Underwing (New for year)

43 moths of 18 species trapped

Total of species trapped in garden 73
Total species trapped in 2010 49
Total number of moths trapped 2010 212

I am not 100% certain of the foxglove pug and knot grass identification so if anyone can confirm or otherwise it would be a great help.

Swallowtail



Rustic



Mottled Rustic



Knotgrass?



Foxglove Pug?



Common Wainscott



Common Footman