A Fox nearly ruins the morning!

Sunday 13th September 2026.

Above, this Italian Bark Moth was only my second for the year.

I had to be in a bit of a rush this morning since rain was forecast early this morning. I was up at 4am this morning due to the annoying fact that I heard a lot of noise coming from my garden and on investigating, a dog Fox was jumping all over my Moth Box trying to catch a Moth!

So, grabbing my dressing gown, I ran downstairs to the kitchen back door and flushed the Fox away from my garden. Only a couple of outside egg trays were knocked over and thankfully, the Moth Box stood its ground due to the heavy brick I place on top of the weather guard! Phew!

My Moth Box:

A Golden Twin-spot with an L-album Wainscot moth.

By 6.20am, though it was still quite dark due to the low cloud overhead, I started recording the Moths on show and in the Moth Box itself. Large Yellow Underwings were easily the most numerous moth with a large total of 19 recorded. The nearest to this number were the L-album Wainscot’s with 6 present. Again, there were no new species to be seen for my year list, but my first Italian Bark Moth (Metalampra italica) for many months and an attractive micro moth species too.

One of 19 Large Yellow Underwing moths this morning. There probably was several more before that Fox disturbed the Moth Box!

Regarding the migrant moths, 3 Clancy’s Rustics, Turnip Moth, 3 Golden Twin-spots, 4 Olive-tree Pearls (Palpita vitrealis) and a Rusty-dot Pearl (Udea ferrugalis) were recorded. The rain was falling as I was checking the inside of the Box and thankfully, it didn’t come to much anyway for I had to take the dogs for their early morning walk!

 

MACRO MOTHS	MICRO MOTHS
Large Yellow Underwing x19	Olive-tree Pearl x4
Lesser Yellow Underwing x4	Chevron Grass-moth x2
Double-striped Pug x3	Rusty-dot Pearl x1
Lime-speck Pug x1	Dark Moss-moth x1
Pale Mottled Willow x2	Italian bark Moth x1
Small Dusty Wave x2	Common Masoner x1
Clancy’s Rustic x3	Light Brown Apple Moth x2
Turnip Moth x1	Common Plume x1
Willow Beauty x1
L-album Wainscot x6
Golden Twin-spot x3
Garden Carpet x2