Egretta garzetta

Remember when Little Egrets were actually rare birds in the UK? And then seeing them more regularly and further inland started being normal, and then they started breeding in small colonies, and then they're everywhere like small pointy white sticks wherever you look .......

Whilst I was being ferried about by Nichola we headed through what used to be Whetstone village (but is now just the middle of a sprawling sub-urban metropolis called Whetstone). Being a passenger means you notice things, like small pointy white sticks looking out of place high up in a tree above Whetstone Brook. As it was still there when we drove back past, I insisted that Nichola ought to bring me back in a few mins with my camera. It was still there, though trying to get anything like a half-decent shot was not easy with crappy lighting and obtrusive twigs in the wrong places. I got it looking both ways. I expect Great White and Cattle Egret, Squacco Heron and Little Bittern in the brook during the next decade.

'Pointy White Stick' in 'Whetstone Village'

Not much excitement in last night's moth trap, but there was a total of 7 Small Quakers. It feels like I usually only see one or two of these in the garden each year, so I checked back. Five or less in all years except 2010 (7 individuals) and 2012 (13 individuals with the highest garden count of 5 on 23/3/2012). I've had 12 so far this year.

Small Quaker - 22/03/2019

Agonopterix alstromeriana - 22/03/2019

Agonopterix heracliana/cilliela agg. - 22/03/2019

Last 2011 Moth

This micro turned out to be the last moth that I recorded in 2011, though I saw a few fluttering geometrids along the lane on Friday night.

Agonopterix alstromeriana

Sadly it's not from last night. It's actually from back on 21/12/2011 (attracted to lit window) and it's been happily sitting in a pot in my fridge ever since - today is the first day I've been at home in daylight since then with enough time to fanny about photographing it. It was very mild but windy last night and I was tempted to get the trap out when we got home from London (not late, we didn't stay for the fireworks etc) but decided against it. In fact the biggest bonus last night was that the windy conditions must have made it hard to get those stupid fucking lanterns going as only one or two seen (versus a 100 or so last year).  I have run the trap on a couple of mild nights in late December but scored bugger all. I was thinking of giving it a go tonight to try and get the 2012 garden moth list up from zero, but after a mild dull grey day it's now pissing it down heavily.

Had a great day in London yesterday making good use of our Merlin passes. We strolled up to and onto the Eye without any of that queueing for tickets nonsense. We last went on it in 2003 when Alex was a baby and Josh was two and a bit, so they remembered about as much of it as me from last time. Afterwards we had a walk along the Thames towards London Bridge passing and seeing a good few landmarks on the way (eg The Globe, The Golden Hind, that stupid Millenium Bridge, St Pauls, the 'Gherkin') and passing lots of street performers and ignorant 'get the fuck out of my way' type joggers. We then went into the London Dungeons. Never been before and wasn't quite sure what to expect but it was great - even the nerve-jangling bits were good and Isabelle's manic screaming at various intervals helped to make it even more fun. The 'hanging' ride at the end (The Drop) was exactly the sort of thing that makes my stomach churn without it being pitch black. We then headed back to the Eye to see the area lit up. We'd already seen the firework barges in the day, and with the massive sound system it did look like it would be a good spectacle but there was no way we were going to hang about for six hours or so. We saw a brilliant firework display at Alton Towers on November 5th anyway and that lasted twice as long as those in London last night - same thing with synched music and lazers, quite probably the same pyrotechnic company running it.

London Fireworks

Eye

Narborough Bog & Garden Tick

Yesterday was mostly spent drinking a few refreshing ciders at the Tigers Rugby (hosted by my work), so it wasn't until late in the evening that I decided to take a few traps out to a couple of local sites (and even later in the night when I got around to posting the photos from Friday night).

I hadn't actually checked the weather - it just felt like a reasonable night with cloud cover holding the temps up until dusk. The first site turned out to be a non-starter as the gated entrance to Enderby Quarry had been fitted with a new padlock - quite possibly by the adjoining timber frame business without consent from the quarry owners. This will be followed up as I wanted to get in there again a few times this year.

With this setback, I headed back over to Narborough Bog and set about carting the cheapo 2-stroke gennie, a couple of traps and three cable reels down to the reserve from the main track. I usually drive up but a new gate has been installed .....

Everything was running without issue at 20:50, and I left the site at 21:15 with every intention of being back at first light. At least that was the plan. This morning I was suddenly aware of my phone alarm going off at 06:20 - it had been self-snoozing for almost an hour without me stirring. I needed to get going quickly, and was concerned when I opened the front door to see that it had rained in the previous couple of hours or so. Now I was very cynical about my chances of enjoying the catch - the gennie would almost certainly have run out of fuel if not died though the rain, and the traps would be full of water surrounded by soaking wet sheets.

I got there at 06:40 and all concerns were immediately allayed when I could hear the rough-arse chuntering of the gennie and see the lights still on. What a superb bit of kit - almost 10 hrs running with 2 x 125W MV traps and cable reels plus resiliance to rain. The traps were wet and the sheets were soaking, but still plenty of moths.

The wood at Narborough Bog is damp and shady at the best of times, so I was not expecting the sort of variety and numbers that I'd get in a more typical broadleafed wood. I was therefore pleased with the overall catch of 166 of 21sp. The main highlights were what I think is a site-first Pale Pinion, Early Tooth-striped and an early Chocolate-tip.

0288 Caloptilia stigmatella 2 [yeartick]
0667 Semioscopis steinkellneriana 8
1746 Shoulder Stripe (Anticlea badiata) 1
1750 Water Carpet (Lampropteryx suffumata) 2
1852 Brindled Pug (Eupithecia abbreviata) 8
1862 Double-striped Pug (Gymnoscelis rufifasciata) 1
1881 Early Tooth-striped (Trichopteryx carpinata) 5 [yeartick]
1917 Early Thorn (Selenia dentaria) 2
1919 Purple Thorn (Selenia tetralunaria) 2 [yeartick]
1927 Brindled Beauty (Lycia hirtaria) 21 [yeartick]
1947 Engrailed (Ectropis bistortata) 2
1957 White-pinion Spotted (Lomographa bimaculata) 1 [yeartick]
2003 Pebble Prominent (Notodonta ziczac) 1 [yeartick]
2019 Chocolate-tip (Clostera curtula) 1 [yeartick]
2186 Powdered Quaker (Orthosia gracilis) 2 [yeartick]
2187 Common Quaker (Orthosia cerasi) 5
2188 Clouded Drab (Orthosia incerta) 20
2190 Hebrew Character (Orthosia gothica) 69
2236 Pale Pinion (Lithophane hepatica) 1
2258 Chestnut (Conistra vaccinii) 1
2469 Herald (Scoliopteryx libatrix) 1

Chocolate-tip

Early Tooth-striped

Purple Thorn

Brindled Beauty

I also found a large noctuid caterpillar - possibly Broad-bordered Yellow Underwing, retained to rear - and also a fresh noctuid pupa attached to the back of some bark I collected for photographic backgrounds.
Slightly less welcome was a fecking huge queen Hornet in one of the traps - don't remember seeing Hornets here before. The other trap was free of Hornets, but surprisingly had a good few Common Carder Bees in it plus a huge queen White-tailed Bumblebee. Both traps had a couple of wasps and one or two Yellow Ophion. I was handling every tray carefully!

Common Carder Bee

The garden traps also did well last night, including another garden tick micro. The total catch was 38 of 14sp. (125W MV 21 of 10, 80W actinic 17 of 10).

0602 Elachista apicipunctella 1 [FIRST FOR GARDEN]
0688 Agonopterix heracliana 1
0695 Agonopterix alstromeriana 1 [first for year]
0998 Light Brown Apple Moth (Epiphyas postvittana) 2 [first for year]
1288 Twenty-plume Moth (Alucita hexadactyla) 2
1497 Amblyptilia acanthadactyla 1
1524 Emmelina monodactyla 2
1728 Garden Carpet (Xanthorhoe fluctuata) 1 [first for year]
1760 Red-green Carpet (Chloroclysta siterata) 1
1862 Double-striped Pug (Gymnoscelis rufifasciata) 5
2187 Common Quaker (Orthosia cerasi) 3
2188 Clouded Drab (Orthosia incerta) 5
2190 Hebrew Character (Orthosia gothica) 10
2243 Early Grey (Xylocampa areola) 3

Elachista apicipunctella - smarter in life than I can capture

Light Brown Apple Moth

Twenty-plume Moth

Agonopterix alstromeriana

The garden traps were emptied with the regular Chiffchaff, Blackcap and Lesser Whitethroat in competition. Later this afternoon, I picked up my first Swifts of the year as two soared over the garden.