Following on from May last year with the lost lady, Brian and I had another moth night with a difference, last night, on the Somerleyton Estate. We set up the 8 traps in the shelter of mixed woodland at Ashby Warren with Fritton Lake to one side and heath the other, both a couple of hundred yards either side of our woodland ride. I thought we would have a good night with Bordered White and Common White Wave coming in as soon as my lights were on. When Brian had set up we went in search of Nightjar on the heath, to no avail, unfortunately. Brian asked if we needed to go back the same way and I said I knew another way back. However it wasn’t long before it all looked rather unfamiliar, we didn’t have powerful torches and everywhere looked the same, that light over there was, after all, just a gap in the conifers where you could see the sky. After about twenty minutes of being lost we did see lights which we thought were ours, but they were lights on the other side of the lake. It was still helpful though, due to our proximity to the lake, and we eventually found our traps. Unfortunately, the traps weren’t full of moths or anything, despite conditions that didn’t seem that bad in the woods hardly anything turned up and the question was will we hit the big 2.0. before the nights out. Packing up at midnight we had managed 23 species with a few first for year for me, this includes White Ermine which was only picked up on the walkabout , Tawny-barred Angle, Spruce Carpet, Freyer’s Pug, Flame. Good number of Orange Footman seen. Best moth perhaps? Birch Mocha.
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