We arrived a bit early to meet friends at the wonderful Dolaucothi Goldmines on Sunday, so I had a look around the carpark for moths. The only imago I disturbed was an Ypsolopha parenthesella, but the Rowans had mines of both Stigmella nylandriella (broad frass completely filling the mine) and S. magdellenae (narrow frass with wide margins). The former is pretty frequent in Carms, but the latter appears to be the first county record. They seemed convincingly different, and on different Rowan trees, at Dolaucothi.
Bashing a birch also produced this madly pink-spiked Pale Tussock larva.
Later in the day we stopped a couple of times, and at both I noticed hairy caterpillars. Both seem to be Nut-tree Tussock, though one is yellow and the other orange.
I find caterpillars illogically troublesome, and even these obvious-looking hairy ones took a lot of effort because I got stuck in the Lymantriidae for ages.
Sam, you may be aware of it, but there's no image of Stigmella magdalenae on the ukmoths website, so Ian Kimber might be interested in your photo.
ReplyDeleteIt's a god that you observe little things while on your journey. It's a good habit to look deeply at the things around you the3y might help you. I write my dissertation by observing such elements that would play a vital role in the investigation.
ReplyDelete