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Clearwing on fungus infected Beech?
Posted by Graeme Lyons , Saturday 29 May 2010 19:12
Last night, Alice Parfitt and I moth trapped Eridge Rocks with two MV traps up until about 11.00 pm. That was after about two hours of beetling. There are some really good old ancient trees there, and one recently (c5 year ago max?) fallen Beech was crawling with inverts. There was Rhagium mordax, Mycetophagus quadripustulatus and a Platystomos albinus. I saw lots of the click beetle Melanotus castanipes/villosus (photographed). I found two dead ones and netted three in flight. I'm not sure if I have ID'd one of the dead ones correctly as it seems to have a reddish pronotum. Alice also found what I am sure is a clearwing moth exuviae. This is unusual though as it was sticking out of fungus infected Beech. I am going to try and ID it from the pupal case alone. The tree was so huge it has created its own clearing and I will be going back there in warm sunshine to see what else is there.
As the night grew dark, the clouds cleared and we were soon covered in biting midges. The first moth was Common White Wave and we were soon besieged by Brown Silver-lines and Cockchafers. The highlights were Satin Lutestring, Cream Wave, Peach-blossom and Brindled White-spot. Over twenty species in the end. I tried filming some moths and cockchafers and will be posting my first crude attempts at natural history presenting on here very soon!
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