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13th July 2013: Broxbourne Wood, Hertfordshire

13th July 2013: Broxbourne Wood, Hertfordshire

I am not sure if it was the phenomenally hot day on Saturday, with temperatures reaching 30 degrees Celsius, or the fact that this trip was to one of the county hot-spots for all things ecological, but we did have a staggering 27 people turn up for the Herts Moth Group trip to Broxbourne Wood National Nature Reserve on 13th July 2013. The West Car Park was completely filled; at one point a police car nosed in, looked, probably thought we were a bunch of weirdos and immediately drove off having turned on his blue lights! In addition to myself, five other people had brought traps and so, as darkness approached, we made use of the fact that the wood has a long and straight ride up the middle; traps were loaded into my Landrover and dropped off at intervals along the ride where they were set up by their owners. In all we ended up with 10 lights here, stretched over a linear distance of 700 metres but, of course, dipping into the sides and various clearings. I confess that I was rather lazy and only one of these (the furthest from the car park) was mine, but as it turned out we really did not need the other five I had in the vehicle. Once these lights were fired up, I also set up a sheet on the side of the Landrover in the West Car Park. People were then free to wander along the trap line and/or stay at the sheet and see what came in.

Almost immediately, the moths started coming and they were still coming as the last four of us packed up the last trap at just after 3 am (most people having left in stages between midnight and about 2 am). I am pretty sure that if we had stayed another hour until daybreak we could easily have added a dozen or more further species to the list, but as it is we had to make do with a total of 208 moth species! Very recently, I was moaning that “hundred nights” were a thing of the past (and of course, when moth-ers talk of “hundred nights” they mean 100 macros). Well … our macro total on Saturday night was 116 species. The astute will realise that this means we had 92 species of micro, but to my knowledge there are at least 3 further species awaiting dissection and it is possible that when this list appears that someone will e-mail me with others that I have overlooked.

There are some rather “good” moths for Hertfordshire in the list – use the Herts Moth Book (or if you are under 50, the web site) to look them up. In number order, I might perhaps suggest you look up, amongst others, 397: Glyphipterix thrasonella (rare in the county); 1088: Pseudosciaphila branderiana (very local); 1449: Elegia similella (nationally scarce); 1494: Capperia britanniodactyla (last recorded in the county at this site); 1771a: Thera cupressata Cypress Carpet (recent colonist – first county record was in 2006); 1943: Hypomecis roboraria Great Oak Beauty (extremely local – we had several in the traps and at the sheet); 2039: Atolmis rubricollis Red-necked Footman (almost certainly part of the recent immigration – we had 6). Two species, in the form of 0926: Phalonidia manniana and 1375: Ostrinia nubilalis have recently been split into two species each – we have retained specimens but not yet looked at these critically. It was good to have both Aethes cnicana and Aethes rubigana so they could be compared and there were other species pairs too, which made the evening informative as well as fun (e.g., Clouded Brindle and Clouded Bordered-brindle). Happily, the numbers of individuals of each species appear to have resumed a near normal setting, although there were singles of just a few species. There were several Satin Beauties, mostly in my trap at the far end of the line and at the end of the session around 2.30 am. Here too, I am told by others, Violet Ground Beetles (Carabus violaceus) were making off with large numbers of Leopard Moths that had not made it all the way to the safety of the trap! Good numbers of Great Oak Beauty emphasise the nature of the woodland habitat at Broxbourne.

Those marked with an asterisk (*) have been named by genitalia dissection. Thanks to all the trap operators who gave me lists of moths from their traps throughout the course of the evening. Please tell me if I missed anything.

C.W.Plant

Below I have listed the species that were present in my traps. As the group was spread out, my traps got different species to what the others got, the best species by far were 2 scarce Map-winged Swifts that came to the Actinic. Also the rare micros wee very pleasing to see in my traps.

12/07/13 – Broxbourne Woods - 1x 125w MV Robinson Trap, 1x 160w MBT Trap & 1x 80w Actinic Trap run from 9.45pm until 3.00am

Ghost Moth Map-winged Swift Tischeria ekebladella Leopard Moth Caloptilia alchimiella Argyresthia goedartella Scythropia crataegella

Yponomeuta evonymella Paraswammerdamia nebulella [NEW!] Cedestis gysseleniella [NEW!] Prays fraxinella Plutella xylostella

Ypsolopha ustella

Coleophora flavipennella Batia unitella Carcina quercana Pseudatemelia flavifrontella [NEW!] Parachronistis albiceps [NEW!] Teleiodes vulgella Teleiodes luculella Blastodacna hellerella Phalonidia manniana Agapeta hamana Aethes cnicana Cochylis atricapitana Pandemis cerasana

Pandemis heparana
Archips podana
Archips xylosteana
Lozotaeniodes formosanus
Epagoge grotiana
Ditula angustiorana

Pseudargyrotoza conwagana Cnephasia asseclana* Aleimma loeflingiana Tortrix viridana Spatalistis bifasciana [NEW!] Celypha lacunana Hedya pruniana Hedya nubiferana Hedya salicella Apotomis turbidana Ancylis achatana

Zeiraphera isertana

Epiblema uddmanniana Eucosma cana Eucosma obumbratana Spilonota ocellana Rhyacionia pinivorana Chrysoteuchia culmella Crambus lathoniellus Catoptria pinella Dipleurina lacustrata Eurrhypara hortulata Perinephela lancealis Udea prunalis Udea olivalis

Endotricha flammealis
Phycita roborella

Ephestia parasitella Capperia britanniodactyla [NEW!] Pterophorus pentadactyla Adaina microdactyla Drinker Pebble Hook-tip Peach Blossom Buff Arches Figure of Eighty Blotched Emerald Common Emerald Clay Triple-lines Blood-vein Least Carpet Small Fan-footed Wave Treble Brown Spot Riband Wave Silver-ground Carpet Common Carpet Barred Straw Common Marbled Carpet Barred Yellow Blue-bordered Carpet Grey Pine Carpet

July Highflyer

Small Rivulet Foxglove Pug Wormwood Pug Currant Pug Grey Pug Green Pug Double-striped Pug Small White Wave Small Yellow Wave Clouded Border Tawny-barred Angle Brown Silver-line Bordered Beauty Lilac Beauty Swallow-tailed Moth Peppered Moth Willow Beauty Mottled Beauty Satin Beauty [NEW!] Great Oak Beauty Pale Oak Beauty Engrailed Brindled White-spot Bordered White Common White Wave Common Wave Clouded Silver Light Emerald Barred Red Poplar Hawk-moth Elephant Hawk-moth Buff-tip Lobster Moth Iron Prominent Pebble Prominent Maple Prominent Pale Prominent Yellow-tail Rosy Footman Red-necked Footman Scarce Footman Buff Footman Common Footman Buff Ermine Short-cloaked Moth Heart and Club Flame Flame Shoulder Large Yellow Underwing Ingrailed Clay Double Square-spot Smoky Wainscot Minor Shoulder-knot Poplar Grey Miller Grey Dagger Bird's Wing Small Angle Shades Dark Arches Light Arches Clouded-bordered Brindle Clouded Brindle Dusky Brocade Rufous Minor* Tawny Marbled Minor Small Dotted Buff Uncertain Marbled White Spot Scarce Silver-lines Oak Nycteoline Burnished Brass Beautiful Golden Y Spectacle Beautiful Hook-tip Straw Dot Snout Fan-foot