[Mothman]

Anyone one interested in giving this a go?

Garden Moth Scheme

Suitable for beginners and ALL gardens. Some participants only have a balcony.

This is an annual survey of moths in gardens covering Britain and Ireland.

It requires running a moth trap overnight and recording most of contents the following morning once a week from March to Nov. Up to 9 weeks with no more than 3 in a row can be missed. This means that one can start near end of March having missed the first 3 weeks. So there is still time to get organised.

Requirements, moth trap, guide book....enthusiasm and a willingness to learn

The last 2 are easy and cost nothing

The guide book is relatively straight froward, but will cost in the order of €30-€40
Field Guide to the Moths of Great Britain and Ireland 2nd edition
Waring , Townsend & Lewington. (link to publisher) about half way down.

There is a concise version which has the same plates, but in my opinion, the full version is worth it for the extra meaningful info, but if the budget cannot stretch the concise version will do.

Moth traps not near as straight forward and unless you go a DIY option, can cost a pretty penny cent and even then, its hard to do it under €50. The issue is electrics and out door environment.

A moth trap is basically a light source and a retaining box/bucket etc. The box is often the DIY part and the light source is often sourced from specialist moth trap supplier. One of my traps uses fish tank electrics with the control unit in a plastic lunch box type container.

See guide to Moth Trapping includes plans for building your own trap
and Guide to Bulbs

and see here for list of moth trap suppliers

I'm hopeful that Littlebug and Half-cocked may be interested in joining the 15 or so currently participating in Ireland, but maybe there are others?

One last thing is, that taking photos of the moths and uploading them to internet will be really helpful with regard identifying them.

Any queries, just ask away....

[Half-cocked]

No rest for the wicked - spring/summer GMS starts this Friday. Thought I'd start a new thread. I'm desperately trying to finish building a new trap in time. Having only caught 3 moths for the entire Winter GMS, I caught 4 the night after it ended! 2 Common Quakers, 1 Hebrew Character and 1 Double Striped Pug.

[Gardener3]

Put the 40W Actinic out in the garden last night and was pleased to get:

Chestnut x2
Clouded Drab
Common Quaker x2
Diurnea fagella x2
Double-striped Pug
Early Grey (NFY)
Early Thorn x5
Engrailed
Hebrew Character x2
March Moth
Pale Brindled Beauty
Yellow Horned (NFY)
Tortricodes alternella - very worn but a micro I've not recorded here before

[Mothman]

Thanks to Half-cocked for starting this thread.
I've messed up the opening post by copying the OP from last years thread.
Sorry

But it contains good info

[Half-cocked]

Originally Posted by Gardener3

Put the 40W Actinic out in the garden last night and was pleased to get:

Chestnut x2
Clouded Drab
Common Quaker x2
Diurnea fagella x2
Double-striped Pug
Early Grey (NFY)
Early Thorn x5
Engrailed
Hebrew Character x2
March Moth
Pale Brindled Beauty
Yellow Horned (NFY)
Tortricodes alternella - very worn but a micro I've not recorded here before

Nice catch, I only got 2 common quakers on Tuesday night. I'm switching from 15w to 40w actinic, hopefully will boost the numbers.

[littlebug]

the trap is out Quite windy so I won't get over excited.

Last year I had 15 moths on the first night.
I wonder will Mothman beat his record breaking 270 moths from night 1 last year

[Mothman]

No chance, just not a good moth day today.
Will be doing well to even get a 10th of that

[littlebug]

Too much weather. No moths but I'm relieved that the trap was intact this morning

[Mothman]

Originally Posted by littlebug

Too much weather. No moths but I'm relieved that the trap was intact this morning

I know how you feel with regard the trap. The wind and torrential rain woke me up during the night.
It was reasonably mild for the first part with temp up to 9C. It dropped to 4c at dawn with frost and ice.

0461 Ypsolopha ustella 1
1663 March Moth (Alsophila aescularia) 3
1917 Early Thorn (Selenia dentaria) 1
1926 Pale Brindled Beauty (Phigalia pilosaria) 1
2187 Common Quaker (Orthosia cerasi) 15
2188 Clouded Drab (Orthosia incerta) 24
2189 Twin-spotted Quaker (Orthosia munda) 4
2190 Hebrew Character (Orthosia gothica) 7
2243 Early Grey (Xylocampa areola) 1
2258 Chestnut (Conistra vaccinii) 6

Half the species and about a quarter of the moths compared to last year!

[littlebug]

Originally Posted by Mothman

The wind and torrential rain woke me up during the night.

same here . and when I was up tending to a sick child I was worrying about the moth trap

Not a bad catch there considering...

[Half-cocked]

1 Hebrew Character last night.

[thebishop]

I had the same start as last year.No Moths.

[Half-cocked]

Did the GMS last night as I am away all weekend.

1 Hebrew Character
5 Common Quakers
1 Early Thorn
2 Double-striped Pugs

[littlebug]

I just put the trap together and hoovered loads of dead flies out of the bulb connection bit LOADS of them.
Looking reasonable weather wise this week. Fingers crossed

[littlebug]

1 lonesome little clouded drab in the trap (and a slug).
Gave me a chance to use my new lens