The end of another year. Since the last post I've added just 2 species to the garden Moth List for 2022: Winter Moth and Mottled Umber. The final total for the year being 405, which is my 2nd best year and only the 2nd time I've passed 400 species. Also surprising is the addition of 37 new species this year bringing the overall total for the site to 731. Interesting birds seen since the last post include A Purple Sandpiper at Hampton Pier and Whooper Swans at Dungeness. 

Winter Moth

 

Mottled Umber

 

Purple Sandpiper

 

Whooper Swan

The end of another (very wet) month has seen only 3 species being added to the moth year list (403) with December Moth being the only new macro. Interesting birds seen since my last post include the Great Grey Shrike at Hothfield Heathlands, Sabine's Gull at Port Lympne Zoo, with Red-rumped Swallows and Snow Bunting at Palm Bay, Margate.

 December Moth

 

Great Grey Shrike

Sabine's Gull

Snow Bunting

 

 We've reached the end of another month. Moth trapping has produced some of the usual Autumn favourites but catch numbers have been low, initially by cold nights and more recently by wet and windy ones.  It's always nice to get a Merveille du Jour and Pink-barred Sallow was only my 6th record. At Dungeness we managed to find one of the several Crimson Speckled moths that had arrived on the warm southerlies. Finally the tiny micro P. messaniella was new for the garden and brought the year list to 400 for only the 2nd time ever.

Merveille du Jour

Pink-barred Sallow

Crimson Speckled

 

Phyllonorycter messaniella

 

 I see this is my first post for 2 months. I spent the first 3 weeks of September on a birding trip to Australia. A Southern Cassowary was the bird of the trip with Duck-billed Platypus as another star species. The moth trap year list has advanced to 383 which already is more than for the whole of last year. Recently Brown-spot Pinion was a new macro for the garden list and other Autumnal favourites have included: Centre-barred Sallow, The Sallow, Barred Sallow, Lunar Underwing, Clancy's Rustic and Green-brindled Crescent. More pictures from Australia will be appearing on my Flickr site.

 Southern Cassowary

 

Platypus

Brown-spot Pinion

Barred Sallow

 

We've reached the end of another month and the total for this year's garden moth list stands at 342. This figure is much better than last year when at the same time it had only reached 273. Since my last post, again to my surprise, I've recorded the 9th. species of Clearwing Moth in the garden this year: Raspberry Clearwing. Also Bordered White was new for the site and Jersey Tigers are becoming more common. Elsewhere the Bonaparte's Gull retuned to Oare Marshes for its 9th year.

Raspberry Clearwing

 

Bordered White

 

Jersey Tiger

 

Bonaparte's Gull

Since the last post I've been surprised to record another 5 species of Clearwing Moth in the garden. Lunar Hornet didn't photograph too well but the other 4 are below. 

Sallow Clearwing

 

Yellow-legged Clearwing

 

Six-belted Clearwing

 

Currant Clearwing

Halfway through the year and the Moth Trap number of species is 211 for the first 6 months. Colder nights recently have kept numbers down but at the same stage last year the figure was only 180. Elsewhere the Heath Fritillaries and Ringlets were showing well at North Bishopden Wood a few days ago, and yesterday I went over to Hothfield Common where the Keeled Skimers were on the wing with Four-spottted Chasers and a Broad-bodied Chaser. 

Heath Fritillary

 

Keeled Skimmer

 

Broad-bodied Chaser