Neil thinks his rather impressive gang of chestnut moths may hibernate in his ivy clumps and come out now and then to feed. This seems very likely – they never seem to be very active or adventurous moths. What has occurred to me over the past couple of years is that the chestnut and dark chestnut may have different hibernating strategies. I saw several dark chestnut earlier this autumn, long before I saw a chestnut, but then they disappeared and there is now only a regular trickle of chestnuts. I wonder if the dark chestnut hibernates early and doesn’t come out once it has found a good spot, whereas the chestnut, as Neil suggests, is not a deep sleeper and goes in search of snacks? This behaviour may already be widely known – I’m not an expert! And it may be that someone has done a PhD on this subject; it’d certainly make a more interesting monograph than some I’ve read.
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