Charlie Fletcher, county moth recorder and retired local GP and self aclaimed leafmining moth obsessive has dedicated his later life to understanding our moths.

In writing 'Highlights' he brings us an uptodate on 2020 through selected species; entertaining us with fascinating insights into the history of moth observation from Porritt onwards. Full of fascinating background on the wonderful world of moths Charlie engages you with every sentance. He philosophises on what could be happening and why in a rapidly changing (warming) world ... A really good read!!

Looking at the map, you could be forgiven for thinking that you might find this moth anywhere. The dots however are mostly from 1960 – 2000 and there is a preponderance of records from RIS traps. Are they all correct? I wouldn’t risk my fiver on that one. The only 2020 dot is from Strensall Common, where it was first seen in 2019. Recent records are thin on the ground and it appears to be very local. It can be strangely common however. We trap every year at the MOD site at Catterick – Foxglove Covert. We usually run several traps around the site. One year, a trap on a small area of heathland attracted 13 July Belles – the commonest moth in the trap! All the other traps attracted one between them, so it probably doesn’t stray far from its ideal habitat.

Both the “Belles” are gorse feeders and are moths of heaths and moors. “Warm heathland of the subatlantic type” says one book. Both are doing badly in the east of the country and have much bigger populations in the west – especially Wales and the counties surrounding Devon. The Field Guide says “identification problems bedevil the records of both Lead Belle and July Belle”. Quite right, and the Atlas even has a map for the “agg.” at the back. You should suspect Lead Belle if the black central spot is “tear-shaped” or “comma shaped” and is equidistant between the two cross lines, rather than a small dot closer to the proximal line. A pale wavy cross line at the edge of the wing may be present, and moths flying in May or the first half of June might also suggest this species. These would need dissection for confirmation. I think Lead Belle is a prettier-looking beast. I don’t think it’s lead-coloured at all, in fact our subspecies of July Belle is plumbaria which means lead-coloured. Confused? You should be.

Other sites followed, but Sutton and Beaumont’s comments that it was “very local in reed beds” in 1989 seems a good summary. A decline to no records at all in 2001 and 2002 was followed by an expansion of range and it reached my area in 2006 where it remained very local. It reached Teesside in 2011 and by 2019 it had been seen at lots of widespread sites in the centre and east of the county. It had even got to the south of Northumberland. But in 2020 in Yorkshire, there were a mere 16 records of 45 moths from 11 sites; a huge drop. Apart from 25 in one session at Skerne Wetlands, all the others were of very small numbers.

Obscure Wainscot is capable of appearing in large numbers when it wants to. Blacktoft Sands has regularly attracted counts of 20 to 40. We had never encountered it at Nosterfield NR until 1/7/15 when we put some traps in the reed bed there and caught 81: a total which has never been beaten in the county. There have only been small numbers since. It is meant to be a sedentary inhabitant of reed beds but it does turn up in odd places. I’ve had it in my garden in 2017 and 19 and have yet to plant my extensive reed bed!

So, what is the cause of this odd behaviour. It over-winters as a larva in stems of common reed. Do they manage reed beds differently in the Broads? The way it moves to a new area, rapidly builds up numbers, then falls of a cliff edge can’t be due to habitat or climatic change, so is it parasitoids at work? I get the impression that there is a lot that we don’t know about this species. Noctuidae Europaeae intriguingly says “at times may be common” which suggests to me that population fluctuations have been noticed elsewhere.

I would love to tell you that it’s scientific name obsoleta reflects its tendency to render itself obsolete at times, but I’m afraid it’s the same as the vernacular epithet, “obscure”, referring to its undeveloped markings. I find this one of the easier Wainscots to identify. It’s obviously different when you have one in the hand.

We had a scattering of records in the middle of the last century from the Grass Wood/Bastow Wood/Dib Scar area and another one from Oughtershaw, but most of our records came from the Rothamsted trap run in upper Ribblesdale at Colt Park between 1990 and 93. This produced 13 records of single moths in its four years of operation. After that nothing was heard for a while and I see that I am quoted in Porritt’s Lists, published in 2011, as saying that our population might be extinct. Luckily, I was wrong, and Dib Scar produced more records in 2013 and 14, and the good news this year is that Paul Millard and Andrew Rhodes caught three there at actinic light in 2020. Another record reached us rather late – one from the Rothamsted trap at Malham Tarn in 2013, the first ever from this site. I haven’t had any records from them since 2015 so I don’t know if there are any more since then.

There are two subspecies. The paler flavicinctata occurs in western Scotland and the Inner Hebrides. The darker ruficinctata occurs in the rest of its range – central Scotland, Cumbria, Yorkshire, North Wales and the Black Mountains. The curious thing is that the north western flavicinctata is bivoltine whereas the others including our moths are univoltine, flying in July and August. With some species that is enough for people to query whether they are separate species, but I don’t think that has been suggested here. Take care not to confuse it with the rather similar Grey Mountain Carpet which however has no orange/yellowy scales.

I feel that it is highly likely that it occurs at other sites in the Dales and it really ought to occur in VC65. It isn’t the easiest thing to find. It appears to have a penchant for RIS traps and actinic traps, and we don’t have a single record at MV light, though I’m not suggesting it won’t come to MV light; it probably reflects the difficulty in lugging generators to remote places. It is said that it can be found resting on stones in the day time. Mossy Saxifrage, assumed (rightly?) to be its only food plant in Yorkshire, is actually not too rare in the Dales according to the on-line Plant Atlas. The south-eastern part of its range is lower Wharfedale apart from some at Greenhow, and it is most common in the limestone areas of Ribblesdale, Langstrothdale, Littondale, the Three Peaks area and a big chunk of land to the west of Hawes. A search for larvae may be one of the easiest ways to find it – we have larval records in May. In other parts of its range, it feeds on other Saxifraga sp. and even Sedum sp., so it’s not impossible it uses other food plants in Yorkshire. Now that Boris says we can all enjoy ourselves this summer, how about a holiday cottage in the limestone Dales in August and a hunt for Yellow-ringed Carpet?

In the late 19th century for a while, it was resident and locally common in Suffolk. Argument again raged as to whether it had been present all along or locally reared and released. Numbers however dwindled after 1907 and it virtually disappeared from Suffolk. There were also sightings in Dorset, mostly in the Poole area, and in the 1920s it became more common here. In the 1930s it finally decided it was time to seek pastures new, and the Dorset moths spread gradually north and east, so that by 1960, there were records in many areas to the south and east of a line drawn from Dorset to the Wash. So, it seems likely that all the current moths stem from Dorset stock. I wonder if this was genetic mutation enabling easier colonisation or whether climatic change was the reason. Curiously it has not managed to spread much further west, and some say the current maps reflect lower rainfall where the moth now occurs.

Progress was slow. Our first record was unsurprisingly at Spurn in 1992. There were no more until 1995 but since then we have had records every year. In 2005 there was a major push forward and there were three records in my area near Ripon. I looked forward to seeing it regularly but it contracted back. It moved forward again in 2010 but again contracted back to the south east of the county. Dithering yet again. Since another trough in 2017, records have increased substantially. In 2020 we had 63 records of 96 moths from 37 sites, 12 of them new locations. There is just the hint of some movement at the borders of the range. What will happen next? Is this a false dawn or the start of some further proper “Dorset style” movement Will we see a further U-turn or will we get a proper “road map” to enable proper colonisation of the county? What is the mothing equivalent of the 1922 committee urging it to do?

The food plant is of course Scots Pine, though it will occasionally use other conifers. It doesn’t need old gnarly ones, as it will also use younger trees. My own 30-year-old Scots Pines are ready and waiting but so far have had no visitors.

For those wanting to know more about the past history of this enigmatic species, there is a fabulous article by Colin Pratt written in 2002. Ent. Rec 114: 235-268.

Scattered single moths kept turning up however. Terry Crawford had the next in 1988 at Acomb, Philip Winter the next in Langdale Forest in 1993, then Jill Warwick and I had one near Ripon in 2004. All at widely separated sites. I suspect that it has been here in Yorkshire all along. It certainly has in Northumberland where it was first found at Catcleugh in the 1930s and again in 1985 when it was bred out of spruce cones. Skinner also found it in Kyloe Woods, shortly after publishing his field guide which is a little ironic, and it has been seen at various sites since then north of our borders.

So, this isn’t a migrant up here, and I’m not at all convinced it has come in on imported spruce. It’s a native species which exists at a very low density and I suspect the moth doesn’t come readily to light. In 2020 as I have said, we had three records. Two from the east of VC62 including Newtondale where it had been seen in 2016, and an unusual record at Halifax – the nearest site to the old Bradford record. It’s a moth which needs mature Norway spruce as the larvae feed on the cones. It will occasionally feed on other conifers, and on the continent, this includes Scots pine, though not apparently here. It’s is certainly resident in the east of VC62 and probably elsewhere. The larvae feed on the ripe seeds between the cone scales according to the Field Guide, high on the tree, and giving rise to clumps of reddish-brown frass hanging from the cones, and you need mature trees with large cones.

When you see it, it’s a Pug on steroids. It’s a stonking great thing with a bold big discal spot. The markings are most like Dwarf Pug but you would need a serious loss of perspective if you confused them in the hand. To be honest, the one we saw looked so unlike a Pug that I took it home for a further look. I don’t think plantations of spruce are the right place to look for it unless they are really mature. I get the impression that you want old neglected ancient spruce. The place I found it, I seem to remember, just had a couple of big trees. I wonder if current forestry practices fell the trees before they are suitable for Cloaked Pug. It flies in June and July, so find some really mature neglected spruce this year and see if it’s in your area!

According to Bernard Skinner, Bradley and Fletcher in a fit of modesty went with Heslop’s old name in their first checklist so he argued it should stay that way and decided to call it Pauper Pug in his identification guide – it has remained “Pauper Pug” in the later editions. Bradley however in 1989 insisted that the name should be Fletcher’s Pug and changed it in the logbook. His argument was that Pauper Pug was based on a misidentification and said “to me the appellation Pauper Pug is unuseful, the moth being no more pauperate than its congeners. On the other hand, the commemorative name Fletcher’s Pug has connotations of inspired field work and discovery”. In all lists since, both names have been used but Fletcher’s Pug has come first in all of them except Riley, and Skinner where it is still called simply Pauper Pug. You will not need to be told which side of the argument I fall on.

Following its original discovery, old specimens in collections were examined and a moth from Thetford in 1953 proved that it had occurred in the country before 1962. Since then, it has been found in a number of counties and was found in Lincolnshire in 1995. It has been seen in various sites in Nottinghamshire in recent years including Clumber Park. I have had my eyes on it for a while and included it in the 2017 report under “moths to look out for”. There has been much argument as to whether it is a long-overlooked native or introduced. One theory is that monks at Tintern Abbey introduced saplings of large-leaved limes to feed their bees, though others disagree and say there was lots of small-leaved lime there already and it will have fed on that. There is little native lime in the Thetford area and it probably arrived on introduced limes so that would support a more recent arrival. I suspect it hasn’t been here too long. The lime woods in Lincolnshire were extensively “worked” in the 1970s and it wasn’t found there until much later.

When trapping at Hackfall Woods on 17th June last year I caught an odd and rather worn Pug which I couldn’t identify. Nothing unusual there! I dissected it and immediately realised it was something unusual. A glance at the book proved it was a male Fletcher’s Pug. It has very distinctive wedding tackle. This site has a lot of mature small-leaved lime and is by far the most likely site for it to occur in my area. It is bound to occur elsewhere in the county and already will be in VC62 and 63 somewhere.

To find this species you really need decent old proper limes – preferably large-leaved or small-leaved, ie not the horrible hybrid “common” limes that are planted everywhere, though it will use these if it is desperate. It has been suggested that optimum conditions are when limes reach 60ft tall and have been undisturbed for many years. Current thinking is that Small-leaved is better than Large-leaved. For leaf-mining enthusiasts, it’s the same trees which produce lots of mines of Stigmella tiliae which again you would be lucky to find on “common” lime, so I reckon if you’ve got tiliae you may very well have the Pug. It flies in the last half of May and the first half of June; hence my moth being worn. If it’s fresh it’s actually fairly distinctive as it has a double postmedial line with a characteristic curve beyond the discal spot. It’s fairly large and is a pale grey colour. If you’re having a bad day you might pass it over as Grey Pug or Larch Pug. If it’s worn, you’ll have to dissect it. See if you can find it in 2021!

Since then, the situation has altered here. Just looking at one year can be misleading. In 2020 we had 141 records of 301 Broom Moths from 55 sites. It’s the best year since 2015 and I even one in my garden which isn’t a common event. That’s a lot of Broom Moths and you could be forgiven for thinking they are doing well. If you look however at the graph, for the last thirty years the numbers have taken a nose dive. OK they have levelled off a bit recently, but they have to, otherwise if they followed the trend line, we would be counting a negative number of moths in a couple of years. Rothamsted data is alarming. The graph shows a steady fall that shows no intention of levelling out. It’s not one of those species where there was a big fall in the 80s and 90s and then a levelling out as we see with so many species, instead it’s as near to a straight line as you can get with moth data and it’s heading downwards. Fast.

The third edition of our Field Guide was printed in 2017. There is no note of alarm at all. The situation is apparently rosy. “Common throughout the British Isles, particularly abundant on northern moorland”. Not a sniff of a problem. We now however have our shiny new Atlas and it’s woken up a bit. “Its abundance has decreased severely since 1970 and the distribution of this moth has also decreased significantly particularly in central and south-east England”. Indeed it has. The map itself might be misleading at the black dots are post-2000 and if you had made them post-2010 it would look at lot different. This moth has deserted large tracts of lowland England.

Some moths react to warming temperatures by moving north. Others move to higher altitude. Broom Moth falls into the latter category. Of all Yorkshire’s moths, this is the one whose uphill movement has been the most dramatic. In the 20 years between 1998 and 2017 it moved upwards an average of 6.3 metres per year. That means that the altitude of the average Broom Moth record has changed from 62m to 188m in 20 years. If you didn’t catch that the first time, I’ll repeat it. 62m to 188m! That’s quite a lot. The 2020 red dots show that it still does occur in lowland areas eg Strensall Common, Terry C’s garden at Haxby, Thorne Moors, a couple of places in VC61, but for how much longer? It is incidentally one of the few species which occurs on Iceland. Perhaps that is where it will end up.

Finally, a useless fact. It’s scientific name, pisi is because Linnaeus wanted to point out its love of garden peas. In Europe apparently it can be a pest in the vegetable patch. I don’t think this has been reported in the UK, where the distinctive and attractively-striped larvae are more likely to be found on many other plants such as heather, bracken, brambles and indeed broom.

Finally finally, don’t forget when you send in the records, its genus changed from Melanchra to Ceramica. I had to manually alter a lot last year.

The drop in numbers in the UK has been accompanied by a decrease in distribution. The loss is patchy but it particularly marked in East Anglia, the Midlands, Yorkshire and Northumberland. There is some spread to a higher altitude and Yorkshire data shows a rise of 1.6m in altitude per year (52 to 85m in 20 years). It therefore isn’t as clear-cut a case of deserting the lowlands that we see in some species, but it’s a tendency in that direction. Climatic change is probably playing a part but it isn’t the full story, and if it really is playing a part, it is making the moth head for more upland locations but not spread north, so perhaps it is a change in farming practices in the lowlands and nothing to do with climate.

Looking at current trends, we still get records fairly regularly from one or two sites: Otley, the Ripon area (including my garden now and again), and parts of eastern VC62. Nine records in 2020 was better than the all-time low of four in 2019 and included new sites at Stokesley and Great Barugh. There have been only two records in VC63 since 2000 so this rather backs up Porritt’s observations. Is some of the problem to do with habitat? It is difficult to find out exactly what it needs, but the larvae feed on blackthorn, hawthorn, crab apple and various others. The Field Guide says “sunny situations but also shady situations”, so that’s a lot of use. It overwinters as an egg on the foodplant, so it must suffer hugely from annual winter hedge cutting. I’m sure I read somewhere that straggly old hawthorn thickets were the best place but I can’t find the reference. My own hedges are cut annually, but I have one long uncut hawthorn/blackthorn hedge forming a barrier between me and next door which might be a source of my moths. One German web site says it’s in decline in many places north of the Alps, due to “uniformisation of the landscape (removal of bushes and hedges, modern agriculture) and the dark forest management without clearings and bushy edges” which sound pretty sensible. It’s rather a parallel with the decline of Lackey which currently isn’t quite so dramatic, but hedgerow management might be a factor there as well.

It’s a lovely moth and I’m always really pleased when I see it in my moth trap in October, or often on the sheet. It would be sad if it disappeared. It’s scientific name, caeruleocephala or “blue-headed” you might not be aware refers to its larva although its head is grey and by no stretch of the imagination caerulean. Classic scholars will like the fact that it is a combination of a Latin first half and a Greek second half, which is why we never refer to “Latin” names. It’s a bit like Grimston hybrids in Yorkshire place names – half Viking and half Anglo-Saxon. The genus, Diloba, invites you to compare “two ear lobes” with the wing markings. I reckon this is a much better description than the vernacular name. It looks like 88 to me anyway.

Finally, don’t get your Figure of Eight and your Figure of Eighty mixed up. We get several records of “Figure of Eight” every year in July!

Those of you with sharp eyes will notice that there isn’t a map of Welsh Clearwing. Well done. That’s because if hasn’t yet been found in the county.

When you are ordering your Lunar Hornet Moth pheromones, it’s worth getting several clearwing pheromones. There may be species we don’t know about in the county such as Red-belted Clearwing or even Orange-tailed Clearwing. The best contender however for someone who wants to discover a new moth for Yorkshire is Welsh Clearwing. It was first discovered in 1854 near Llangollen, hence the name, and Wales is still the stronghold. Other colonies however have been found recently with the help of pheromones. It was rediscovered in Staffordshire at Cannock Chase in 2005, a “strong colony” was found at Sherwood Forest in 2008 and at Borrowdale in 2014. Info from ALS says “the insect responds well from 8:30am - 1pm. Try old stands of birch on heathland especially in Shropshire, Derbyshire or Yorkshire, they must be there!” So If ALS tells us it might occur here, we really need to get our fingers out and find it.

The scientific name, scoliaeformis refers to a genus of wasps, Scolia, which it is said to resemble. The two abdominal bands, thoracic stripes and orange tail mean it is unlikely to be confused with any other species occurring in the county, but the diagnostic clincher is apparently the central black forewing mark which has a small extension pointing to the base of the wing.

So, we really need someone to look at all of our main lowland heaths with some pheromones. Strensall, Skipwith, Allerthorpe, Thorne Moors. Even smaller ones like Pilmoor may well hold it. It apparently likes mature birches with unshaded trunks so the larvae don’t get too chilled. “Old gnarled trees growing in open acidic situations” is one description of where to look. You need to be looking in June and the first half of July. If you are investing in pheromones, it’s not a bad idea to get the full set. It doesn’t cost a lot more. And while you’re at it, don’t forget the Emperor Moth pheromones!

Wrong again! We now have a pheromone lure and it is very successful. Several people experimented with it last year and it really works. We had 21 records of Lunar Hornet Moth last year and 15 were found by using pheromones. The map shows lots of 2020 dots at new sites and it is really a map of who has been using the pheromones rather than where the moth occurs. If you want some, they are available from Anglian Lepidopterist Supplies – they have them in stock and mine arrived last week together with a nice new pheromone trap. I’m looking forward to giving them a try.

Info from ALS says: “a new lure (lun) was introduced for this species in 2020. Response times from 9am until 4pm. Multiple catches to the lure have been seen when used with the pheromone trap. Lures used in conjunction with a pheromone trap should be checked at least every 15 minutes and once the species has been seen then the lure should be returned to its sealed container. Observers should be aware this lure has also attracted Hornet Clearwing on two occasions so check your identification”. (Hornet Moth has a yellow head and shoulders whereas Lunar Hornet Moth has a yellow collar before you ask.)

So, the places are to try are those with mature goat, grey and crack willows in damp ground. In fact, anywhere with mature willows is worth a try. It does occasionally use poplar as well. You need to be looking from mid-June to early August. The peak in Yorkshire is the second week in July. Good luck!

What on earth has happened to Double Dart. In 1883 Porritt said “very common, no doubt everywhere” and in 1907 “abundant everywhere”, so it must have been one of the commoner species about at that time. It is not obvious when it started to decline. In 1983, Barry Goater, writing in MBGBI said “occurring rather locally throughout the British Isles; rare or absent in some tracts of apparently suitable county although common elsewhere”. In 1989, Sutton and Beaumont looking at the Yorkshire situation said that it was “widely distributed but seldom common” and was more unusual in “the south” and in VC65, preferring woodland on rich calcareous soils. So, in a nutshell, the distribution had become patchy at some time between 1907 and 1983.

Between 1980 and 2000, the population in Yorkshire suffered a huge crash of about 90%, and this is mirrored by the Rothamsted data where the graphs show a major decline until 2000 and then a levelling out. Our Yorkshire population has also levelled out since 2000 as you can see in the graph. Looking at the Atlas it only gives part of the story and simply charts a 95% decline in abundance between 1970 and 2016 without mentioning the sudden fall followed by the plateau which is far more interesting. This is one of the dangers about looking at abundance trends in the Atlas. It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking that a 95% reduction over 46 years means a 2% drop each year, but it masks sudden falls and long plateaus, and this is the same with many species. The rate of change is rarely uniform.

Of equal interest is the change in distribution. Again, the reduction appears most dramatic between 1970 and 2000 with major losses in the south, centre and north-east of England. I see I wrote on the Yorkshire Moths web site in 2011 “… has been lost from many areas of central Yorkshire. Numbers in VC61 however have increased and this population is becoming nationally important” and I think ten years down the line this is still very true.

This year’s map really emphasises the point. The black dots of past records are thickly clustered in the centre and east of the county, but in 2000, the red dots show all 56 records of 84 moths are clustered in the east. I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of it in central Yorkshire. It might not be on its death bed but it’s decidedly under the weather. I tend to get it in my garden on the VC64/5 border every couple of years but I haven’t seen it for the last two years. In fact, I haven’t seen it anywhere for two years. The VC61 population is interesting. It appears to have crashed earlier than in the rest of Yorkshire but has been relatively stable since 1985 and is doing very well at some sites, though actual numbers have become lower and it’s now seven years since we saw over ten in a trap at once.

There seems to be no obvious reason why it has decided to leave central Yorkshire for greener pastures in the east of the county. Perhaps the soils there are “richer and more calcareous”. Similar things are happening in other parts of the country. Not a move east, but contraction of larger populations to much smaller areas. It is a moth of broad-leaved woodland and the larvae feed on various broad-leaved trees, so it isn’t a fussy eater. Our Field Guide says “long known to undergo cycles of abundance”. I’m not sure where it gets that information from as I can’t see it mentioned anywhere else. Are we just living through a cycle? If so, it’s a rather big one. Wouldn't it be nice to understand what is causing all these different changes with our species! There seem to be all sorts of different patterns and different factors at play. Insects in general are such sensitive indicators of what we are doing to our countryside - far more than birds - and the huge amount of data we are now gathering really should allow us to draw some conclusions. Instead, the more I look at it, the more questions are asked.

Today, another map with no red dots from 2020. Black dots are post-1950. If anyone recorded Argent and Sable in the county in 2020, I didn’t get the records.

Argent and Sable in Porritt’s day was “common in several localities among birch”. He listed it from several sites in 1883 and in 1907 said it was “abundant in many localities in the southern and western divisions, and occurring as far north as Middlesbrough. It also seemed to have been fairly common in counties to our south and west. It was never common to our north, with very few records, the last Northumberland record being in 1956 from Dipton Woods – a large area of woodland near Hexham. Sutton and Beaumont in 1989 said that it was “now quite scarce with few records since 1970” but listed several sites from the 1970s and 1980s. The Atlas says that it is “much declined in England and Wales, probably due to unfavourable woodland management” but it is “doing a lot better in the western Scotland where it is associated with Bog Myrtle rather than birch.” In Yorkshire, apart from Bishop Wood which has been the main site in the county since Porritt’s time, it is worth looking at the last dates where it has been recorded elsewhere in the last 50 years.

Beecroft Moor Plantation, Fewston: 1981. I’ve looked for it here, unsuccessfully though the habitat looked not too bad.

Huntington (York) 1982

Askham Bog 1982

Pilmoor 1984

Owston Wood (Doncaster) 1986

Howell Wood Country Park (Barnsley) 1991

Stocksmoor Common (Wakefield) 1993

Stoneycliffe Wood (Wakefield) 1993

In 2011 a colony was found at Boltby Forest where we have had several records of good numbers up to 2018. In 2018 a moth was also seen in woodland north of Hawnby (also the Small Brindled Beauty site). So, the current situation is that we appear to have two colonies in the county – healthy numbers at Bishop Wood and regular sightings in the Boltby/Hawby area. For a showy day-flying moth, one could be forgiven for thinking that it would be unmissable, however I suspect that there may well be other colonies in the county waiting to be discovered. If we get some sunshine at the end of May and we’re not all “locked down”, it would be nice to search for more colonies. In addition to exploring more woodland in the Boltby/Hawnby areas, there may be places near Bishop Wood. Gateforth Wood to the south west looks promising – I went there too late in the year to find it. Other woodland in VC63 where it was found in the 1980s is also worth searching, especially if you can find some with low birch regrowth. It’s not impossible it might turn up again at Strensall or Skipwith Commons where there are records from the 1950s and 60s.

This is a day-flying species which should be looked for on warm sunny days at the end of May. If you look for it after the middle of June it will be too late, and the best time is probably the last week in May or the very beginning of June. It needs birch woodland (either silver or downy birch) with trees of different ages – the larvae seem to like low regrowth less than 40cm tall in full sunshine. So coppiced woodland is ideal, and the lack of coppicing may be linked with its downfall. It is worth looking for the larvae in July. They feed in spinnings – wrapped inside a folded birch leaf, feeding on the inside of the leaf creating windows which can reveal their presence. The larvae are reasonably distinctive, though it is possible to mistake them for July Highflyer which can also feed on birch.

It will be no surprise to learn that it has been increasing its distribution “significantly since 1980” according to the Atlas, and it is still ongoing. It's on the move, albeit a bit slowly. Since 2000, populations in the south-east of Scotland appear to be moving into the north of Northumberland and Welsh populations into the south of Lancashire. Cumbrian populations are inching towards us and there have even been records in Lincolnshire. This is a moth that could reach us from any direction, and there is a parallel here with Red-necked Footman which probably invaded us from three directions at once. I have a hunch however that our first record will happen in a few years’ time in the south-west of the county.

This is a moth of woodland and scrubby areas with blackthorn and hawthorn, so there is no shortage of habitat in the county. It should be looked for from mid-June to mid-August. Its markings are fairly distinctive and you are unlikely to mistake it for anything else.

Porritt listed records of Scarce Footman from Bramham, Scarborough, York and Everingham. It was probably never a common moth and Yorkshire formed the northern limit, certainly on the east side of the country, though it may have extended further north on the west. The 1970 Yorkshire list decided Porritt was referring to Northern Footman and also mentioned a record of Northern Footman from Sheffield in the 1950s, but in 1989 Sutton and Beaumont disagreed and stated it was unlikely that Northern Footman had ever occurred in the county. This is likely to be correct. Scarce Footman and Northern Footman were given separate numbers in the old B&F list but are now lumped together in the A,B&H list, so Northern Footman is now considered a rare subspecies, restricted to raised peat bogs and boggy moorland from Lancashire to North Wales.

Like so many other species, Scarce Footman retreated south to the line from north Norfolk, through the midlands to south Wales. Quite why so many species did this in the first half of the 20th century is quite fascinating. Expansion of its range seems to have started in the 1960s and it followed the usual trend of appearing first in Yorkshire at Spurn, in 1970. It evidently found Spurn to be the promised land. A place it had been dreaming about which had everything a moth might need, and the most wonderful tasty lichen, so it built up its numbers there and showed no inclination to go anywhere else. In fact, for the next 36 years, the next 1,238 records on the database are all from Spurn. For an expanding moth this is a quite remarkable lack of ambition.

In 2006 it all changed. A new wave of moths arrived suddenly at four sites in the south of VC63 and the following year moths were found at several sites further north in VC61. It is not clear whether they were part of the same coordinated influx from the south or whether the Spurn moths had been looking at the travel brochures at last. The line of advance has been slow and steady since then, rather in the manner of Varied Coronet with no tendency to send out advance scouts further north and west that we see in other species. It reached VC62 in 2012, VC64 in 2013 and VC65 in 2016. The line of advance shows no sign of stopping. New 10K squares are ticked off methodically. 10 in 2019 and a remarkable 12 in 2020 – the biggest number for any species. The map shows many of these are in the north of VC62 where it has now almost reached our northern limits. Westerly spread has gone as far as Skyreholme (Appletreewick), Golcar and Thornton (Bradford). The dot in the far west of VC65 is a 2019 record likely to have come from a population in south Cumbria.

Like most Footmen this is a lichen feeder, and like most lichen feeders it has been expanding its range. Cleaner air is usually trotted out as the reason, but I just wonder if it is a simple as this. The stop-start colonisation is unusual. We appear to have had two invasions, but why was the first sedentary and the second more adventurous? The graph of records per year is unexpected. It shows good numbers at the Spurn Colony until 2000 then a fall. Since the 2006 invasion however, numbers have been slowly and steadily rising, but the rise in numbers is comparatively small compared with the territory conquered.

Our first record in 2009 wasn’t in the south west of the county, but was in VC62 at Kilburn. The following year it was at Hardcastle Crags in the west of VC63 where by 2011 catches of up to 30 were being seen at light. By 2014 it had reached North Cliffe Wood in VC61 and by 2016 it was in the south west of VC64. It has been seen on the VC65 boundary near Ripon but has not yet crossed the river. The current distribution is in a band across the centre of the county as far as the east of VC62 where catches have sometimes been into double figures in the last two years. Despite all this, it is still a local moth with a widely scattered population. The biggest number of records was 13 in 2019 and there were just eight in 2020, so it’s not turning up everywhere and remains rather elusive.

This is typically a moth of damp open woodland where the larvae feed on marsh bedstraw or fen bedstraw, and this is certainly where the biggest numbers occur, though I’ve seen it a few times now in various habitats including gardens. It is bivoltine with records in May/June and August/September. A first brood moth could be confused with Water Carpet which is larger, shinier, and has a different shape to the outer edge of the dark cross band. The moth itself is a different shape and always seems to me to have its wings spread out further making it into a triangle with a wider base. I’ve also seen it confused with Small Phoenix which has rather similar markings and is the same size and shape. Every year we get records of “Water Carpet” in August. This isn’t meant to have a second brood but once in a blue moon this is actually correct, and in 2017 we even had a Water Carpet on 14th October, but more often they are actually Devon Carpet. Often there is no photo so we simply don’t know.

Is this just climatic change causing the movement? If so, why does it happen so rapidly? Why are similar changes not being seen in the rest of Europe? Are genetic factors involved enabling it to adapt to different environments? Has it adapted to feed on different Galium species? Has it found some new defences against predators? It all makes little sense to me. There has been a series of invaders from the south-west in recent years. Which one is going to be next?

It seems therefore that we’re not going to find it inland. But wait, is it a simple as that? Looking at the Atlas, there are recent records inland further south. OK some might be migrants, but there is a cluster in Northamptonshire which look like residents, not to mention a lot of dots in the London area and inland Hampshire. Noctuidae Europaeae says for food plants “the larvae feed on various soft, broad-bladed grasses eg Poa, Festuca, Dactylis etc.”. No mention of sticking to marram grass, in fact no mention of it at all. The distribution map shows it widespread over all European countries except for Scandinavia, with no bias for coastal sites. My French book which charmingly calls it “Le Crochet Blanc” (the white hook as opposed to our “white L”) says the same.

This is a moth about which we will hear more. Expect a march north and spread inland. You shouldn’t have any difficulty identifying it - it’s a Shoulder-striped Wainscot with attitude. By 2030 just perhaps you’ll have it in your garden!

This is an antisocial moth which appears on its own in the moth trap. It seems to have few friends and it rather enjoys social distancing. The most ever caught in the county in one session is three. Numbers have increased considerably in the last two years and in 2020 there were 91 records of 92 moths from 51 sites. The slow march across the county continues and the map shows a lot of new sites at the periphery of its range forming a new frontier; Luddenden, Keighley, Otley. Knaresborough, Hutton Conyers, Helmsley and Skelton are all new sites to where it has advanced before calling a halt and planning next year’s campaign. We now have a VC65 record as is has advanced from Sharow, a mile away in VC64, to cross the border into my garden. This is despite the lack of Sweet Williams in my flower beds so it must have been a bit miffed when it arrived. If you haven’t recorded this moth, a good gambit is a trip to the garden centre when lockdown permits, to stock up on its favourite food plant. Take care not to confuse it with the rather similar Marbled Coronet, though this has become a much rarer moth in the county, in fact it is now so unusual that we need to see photographs of any possible Marbled Coronets you might catch

The situation has altered in 2020 and numbers of records have shot up. This has again been associated with a marked range expansion. Western expansion has given us records at Bradford, Bramley and Otley, and one at Coniston Cold is a bigger jump north-west. Of even more interest is a record at Middlesbrough. This is suggestive of one of its long-distance dispersals and it will be interesting to see if this is another successful colonist. Something certainly has been happening to this moth in 2020; one of our own Yorkshire moth’ers even found the first two moths for Ireland!

The current wave of moths does not appear to be decimating the lettuces in our gardens as they have a taste for the wild ones. Larvae are frequently found in Yorkshire on both prickly lettuce and great lettuce, and have apparently also been found on wall lettuce in other parts of the country. The food plants have increased in range in recent years and are both now common on Teesside. I would not be surprised if we see a new colony in the Teesside area and perhaps further north, where spread is likely to be coastal. I suspect there will be less spread to the north-west unless other food plants such as wall lettuce are utilised.

Adult Small Eggar is rarely seen, possibly because of the early flight time of January to March (Field Guide) or February to April (Atlas) at a time of year when most people tend to trap in their gardens rather than venture further afield. The only record on our database of an adult caught at light was one at Haxby in 2007, and I get the impression it is not a moth that wanders widely. It is usually recorded as larvae in webs in hedges – usually blackthorn or hawthorn, and there have been small numbers of records from the Malton and Pickering areas in recent years. The exact distribution has been quite uncertain – until now. Sam Newton has been doing some fantastic work in 2019 and 2020 surveying this area for larval nests and has discovered a huge number of locations. I’ve tried to show these on the map and if I’ve got it correct, the 2019 records are in red and the 2020 in blue. We can really see the proper distribution for the first time. You will notice that the records go up to the Derwent and don’t cross into VC61. This doesn’t mean that the river forms a boundary and that it doesn’t occur in VC61, rather that this area hasn’t yet been properly surveyed. I hope the study will continue this year and find more records in this direction.

Poor hedgerow management in the past might have contributed to the decline of this species, as cutting out of season from April to June damages the larval webs. It over-winters as a pupa near the ground but it could be affected as an egg if hedges are cut in February. I was surprised that managed hedges tended to do better than those left to grow unchecked and rarely cut. Sam has been able to draw some interesting conclusions and advice on hedgerow management.

I wonder if this is the full story. Does it occur outside the core area? Why does it just occur in this area? Where did the Haxby moth come from? It is quite a distance for it to fly from the core area and I strongly suspect it occurs a little further south. We have a 1950 record from Allerthorpe Common which of course is not far from where it was not uncommon at Everingham in Porritt’s day. It was caught by Denis Wade and I have the specimen in my collection. It is certainly well worth while keeping an eye open for larval webs from late April to early July in hedges anywhere on the east sid

2. A tendency to wander. Some upland moths quite commonly seem to wander to lowland habitats. For example Haworth’s Minor and Heath Rustic. In my own garden I have trapped Glaucous Shears on three occasions in 20 years, usually after westerly winds, and I am seven miles as the moth flies from suitable habitat. Other sites closer to the moors have trapped it a little more often. So, although it does wander, I am not convinced it wanders large distances. I would be surprised if it wandered 20 miles on a warm windy night.

3. It is not just simply a moorland moth and exists at a low density on (for example) our lowland heaths. Lowland heaths are not mentioned when it comes to describing the habitat of this species. It doesn’t seem to utilise them in other parts of its range, for example it is absent from heaths in Dorset and Hampshire. There are however hints in some Yorkshire accounts. It was a common moth in Porritt’s day and he listed a lot of sites, almost all in upland areas of the county, however one site on his list was Skipwith Common and we also know that Prest found it in 1883 at Askham Bog. In 1907 Porritt wrote that it “occurs more or less commonly on probably all extensive heaths and moorlands throughout the county”. Sutton and Beaumont in 1989 said “probably locally common in many of the moors in vice-counties 62-65, but also states “occasional in other habitats in all five vice-counties”. Since then, it has been seen at Skipwith rather vaguely “in the 1980s” and two records at Haxby in 2009 and 2019 raise the question as to whether these might be wanderers from an undiscovered population at Strensall Common which is a stone’s throw away.

2020 was a very good year for Glaucous shears in Yorkshire with 59 records of 175 moths from 34 sites, mostly in the usual upland areas in the west of the county and the east of VC62. There were big numbers on Keighley Moor with several counts into double figures, so the habitat here must be ideal. Of more interest however were six unusual records from lowland sites, at Owston, Wintersett and Austerfield in VC63 and at Askham Bog, Bishopthorpe and Ripon in VC64. The Ripon moth might have been a wanderer, but some of the others are just too far for wandering moths to travel on westerly winds. The Askham Bog record this year is interesting, and there is plenty of bog myrtle at this site. Perhaps it is resident there. Bishopthorpe is only a mile or so away so perhaps this was a moth wandering from the same site. Was the Austerfield moth a wanderer from Hatfield Moors? Was the Owston moth a wanderer from Thorne Moors? Where did the Wintersett moth (the second at this site) come from? As usual, the more one studies the records that come in each year, the more questions need to be answered.

Some of these recent records may be wanderers from Lincolnshire and it is unlikely that it is currently resident. We do however have a proper stable relict population further up the coast. This is centred around Bridlington, Flamborough and up the coast to Scarborough. We get records from these sites most years. In 2009 we received two records from Pickering. These were accepted but there was always a slight question mark as they were out of area and there was no photo. This year however, we had three records of six moths from another site in Pickering which backs up the previous records and confirms that the range extends inland. Together with further records from Scarborough, Flamborough and Bridlington, it paints a slightly rosier picture.

Looking at the recent Atlas which of course documents records to the end of 2016, it implies that although numbers have reduced, there has been some range expansion, and looking at the periphery of its range, there is a hint that in some parts of the range, it is creeping forward. It might be a little early to get excited, but I wouldn’t be surprised if in ten years’ time we are documenting a fresh invasion of the south and east of the county.

This is a moth of wet areas. The larvae feed on bulrush (or do we still have to call it reed mace now, I can never remember), but also iris, common club-rush and branched bur-reed. The latter of course is *Sparganium *from which the moth itself (Globia sparganii) is named. It’s one of the few species that doesn’t feed as an adult, relying on the abundant fat reserves laid down as a larva, and has a reduced proboscis. You therefore won’t find it at sugar. Apparently, moorhens and coots are experts in finding thelarvae hiding within the leaves and stems, and are serious predators. Wainscots are tricky things to identify at times but this one is not too difficult. It flies in August and if you were careless you might confuse it with Bulrush Wainscot. The closest “look-alike” is apparently Rush Wainscot but this is a moth of the Norfolk Broads which hasn’t (yet!) been seen in Yorkshire. I reckon it has the potential to turn up almost anywhere in the county now, so do think of it when you find a “funny Wainscot” in August that you’re not sure about.

As its name helpfully suggests, it feeds on lichens on trees, so this is yet another example of a lichen-feeder doing well. Noctuidae Europaeae is a useful source of information here. It implies the larvae aren’t too hard to find (September to June) and occur on “various unidentified lichens growing on the trunks and branches of both forest trees and fruit trees as well as wood lying on the ground, on wooden fences, walls and planks”. Even stone walls and concrete fences are said to be used. It suggests that although a wide range of trees are used, fruit trees, especially cherry and plum are favourites, but also apple, pear, poplar and oak. Interestingly they are said to be sometimes found “in numbers” on glue rings used for Winter Moth control. Right, I’m off to get some glue rings for the fruit trees. I don’t care about the Winter Moths!

There have been fairly small numbers of records in recent years but 2020 was far more interesting. We received 23 records from 16 sites which is a very healthy total. In addition to moths from the usual areas, there were two extremely unusual records. Firstly, a moth was caught at light at Kilnwick in the middle of VC61 on 6th August. This is almost 20 miles from the nearest record. Was this just a wandering moth? Does it really occur somewhere in the area? Is there some suitable habitat we are not aware of in the vicinity? It is not usually thought of as being a migrant so it is not likely to have come too far. Secondly another moth was caught at Haxby on 15th August. This site regularly attracts wandering moths from Strensall Common which is not too far away. In some parts of its range for example Dorset, it occurs on lowland heaths. Do we have an undiscovered population at Strensall or indeed on any of our other lowland heaths? Perhaps after all, it is an unknown migrant and this is analogous to the odd influx of Light Knot-grass to lowland areas in 2019.

The situation in Yorkshire shows stable numbers since at least as far back as 1995 so is at variance with comments in the recent Atlas which notes “Since 1970 it has undergone severe, ongoing decreases in abundance and distribution”. What is happening in Yorkshire? Wait for next year’s exciting episode.

The range has again inched forward a few miles and new sites on the frontier include the Lower Derwent Valley and Kirk Smeaton. The two populations are now about 25 miles apart at the nearest point. If the rate of advance continues at the same rate, the populations may well join up in about five years. It all rather reminds me of Vikings advancing into Anglo-Saxon territory, or have I been watching too much Vikings on Amazon Prime?This raises some interesting questions. What is going to happen when the populations meet, if indeed they do? The two populations have been reproductively isolated probably for over 100 years. Will there be genetic differences and what will their effect be? Will the invaders being new diseases or specific parasitoids that the native population will be unable to cope with, or will the opposite be true and the newcomers will succumb? Will interbreeding bring hybrid vigour so that the forces join up and invade new territories? Will the invaders adapt better or worse to ash woods in the Dales? What will be the effect of ash dieback on either population? Are the new invaders adapted to feeding on other trees rather than just ash? In parts of the country Coronet apparently uses alder and hazel. The only two larval records on our database are Porritt’s old record from Leyburn and one from Grass Wood many years ago, so are we correct in assuming that it just uses ash here? Will the two populations remain separate so we are left with “upland” Coronets and “lowland” coronets. So many questions!

In 2020 there was evidence of a range expansion north-west with several new sites on the periphery of its range including a jump to near Skipton and to my garden in the south-east of VC65. So when interpreting the map, the north-eastern records in VC62 and the north of VC61 are the first wave of invasion in the 1990s, and the record in the west of VC64 is the early Settle wanderer. So ignoring these gives us a nice line of advance heading north west.

It seems that it can now be found almost anywhere in the centre, south and east of the county and it will be interesting to see whether its rather stop/start progress will continue. In 2020 we received 51 records of 52 moths from 32 sites, so all except one were of single moths. The maximum ever caught in one trapping session is four which makes me wonder if it more common than we think and just isn’t strongly attracted to light. Most of our records are from gardens and the main garden food plant is often horse chestnut rather than the usual sycamore or field maple. We commonly get records of the rather spectacular larva - 14 records on the database including two this year

In 2020 we received only 33 records of 36 moths from 24 sites, so virtually all records were of single moths. On the database, 82% of records are of single moths (suggesting perhaps that it might not come strongly to light), but even so, counts of five to 15 have been not particularly unusual, and at one site above Pateley Bridge in 2008, 40 were caught at light. Having said all that, I had two in my trap in 2020 and I’m at 35m above sea level, so perhaps all is not lost!

There was a major jump to the west when one was caught near Hebden Bridge by a new moth trapper, operating her trap for the first time. This of course should really not be allowed! Most likely this was another wandering moth but there is now a population in Lancashire, not too far away. There were no more records from the east of VC61 which was a little surprising. Again, it will be fascinating to see what happens next. Further consolidation in the south-east of Yorkshire is likely, but will we see it colonising other areas in the next few years? The food plant is predominantly oak, so mature oak woodland is the preferred habitat, but it seems to be able to turn up in all sorts of places.

It is a moth of open woodland with bilberry, but records spill out onto open moorland and it has a tendency to wander and to be found in sites with no obvious suitable habitat in the vicinity. It occasionally pops up in gardens. The Field Guide says that the food plant is bilberry but European literature suggests heather (Erica and Calluna) as common food plants and it has been found on heather in Ireland. I get the impression that it flies fairly early as I have found it dusking in upland open woodland. I think I was looking for Bilberry Pug at the time, and the two species have a lot of parallels with similar habitat requirements and similar recent expansion of range.

In 2020 there was a remarkable expansion of range and we now have a new frontier – Halifax and Keighley in the West, Brompton-by-Sawdon in VC62 in the north, Little Preston in VC64, and Wheldrake Ings to the south-east of York. A total of 17 sites in 2020 of which ten are new. Five records were of moths from a second brood. The big question is what will happen next. My guess is that the range will contract for the next two or three years, there will be a period of consolidation and “infilling”, then it will be on the march again. It is probably enjoying being free of its usual parasitoids but I’m sure they will catch up with it. Of course, I might be totally wrong and it might carry on expanding. Speculating about this sort of thing is what makes recording so interesting. Perhaps it will reappear at Askham Bog and then will have come full circle. My aspens are ready and waiting. There will be an MV trap underneath them this May.

Porritt said in the 1880s that it was “abundant in all gardens containing currant bushes” and field guides suggest that the recent decline is because gardeners use insecticides on their currants. Really? I certainly don’t and I lost my V-moths 15 years ago. Perhaps currants aren’t grown as much in gardens, but perhaps the more likely reason is that climatic change is playing a part. In Yorkshire over the last 20 years, the average altitude of records has increased by nearly two metres a year implying that warming temperatures might make living in the lowlands less easy.

The choice of food plant might not be as simple as it appears. The Geometrid Moths of Europe states that its main food plant is wild gooseberry though it will also utilise red and black currants. The Field Guide implies that red and black currant are the main food plants. All three species are neophytes in the UK with no records in the wild before 1600 which makes me wonder if we had V-moths here before that date. Wild gooseberry is widespread in Yorkshire, particularly in the north of the county, and it occurs in a lot of hedgerows in my area. I wonder if it is using this more than we think.

Books tell us this is a moth of gardens and allotments, which to a certain extent it is, but I get the impression from records in my area that it is a moth of open woodland, woodland edges and hedgerows. It over-winters as an egg on the food plant and perhaps over-enthusiastic hedgerow management might play a part. There is certainly much we don’t know about this enigmatic species. I hope that we manage to keep our population here.

The only probable second brood example we have had was the Calderdale moth on 27/9/19, but second broods are likely to become more common. This is of course all dependent upon weather patterns and may well be influenced by the presence or absence of its parasitoids which may well check the spread.

Many other species have shown variations of this pattern including Vine's Rustic, Scarce Footman, Pine Hawk-moth, Dingy Footman and the recent wave of Coronet. There are one or two species which look as if they are going to do the same in years to come for example Tree-lichen Beauty and Toadflax Brocade.