Another excellent haul of Moths this morning.

Friday 11^th September 2026.

A bright sunny start here in Pembroke Road, Old Portsmouth. The two large Sycamore trees are losing their leaves now with a carpet of leaves on the pavement.

Unfortunately, I was up at stupid o’clock for the heavy rain overnight woke me up and so I had to get up now that I was wide awake at 4am! It wasn’t light till after 6am, but despite the heavy rain that thankfully was long gone by the time I got out into the back garden, I then checked a very soggy Moth Box.

There wasn’t a cloud in the sky when I ventured outside into the garden, but there was very little flying over and no sign of any visible migration. The only bird of note flying over was a distant Greenfinch, but there was a Chiffchaff calling quietly in the back gardens. A Robin was ‘ticking’ again in the large tree at the back of my garden, but no sighting of the bird.

Above, a Batman Hoverfly and below, a Birch Shieldbug were both in my Moth Box.

Insects attracted to the Moth Box overnight included a Batman Hoverfly (Myathropa florea) and my first Birch Sheildbug (Elasmostethus interstinctus) of the year.

 

My Moth Box:

One of two Angle Shades moths this morning.

I thought yesterday’s Moth total recorded was never going to be beaten this week but today proved it wrong with a bigger total of 81 moths of 24 species. Though there was nothing new for the year, the numbers of certain species were incredible, noticeably the Large Yellow Underwings with at least 19 present. 10 Pale Mottled Willows was also a good total along with 9 L-album Wainscot’s.

Above, a good count of 7 Olive-tree Pearl moths this morning and below, at least 19 Large Yellow Underwings were recorded today.

Notable Moths this morning included up to 6 Golden Twin-spots, 2 Angle Shades, 2 Turnip Moths and a Clancy’s Rustic. All migrant species. Regarding the micro moths; Rusty-dot Pearl (Udea ferrugalis), Olive-tree Pearl (Palpita vitrealis) and my first Diamond-back Moth (Plutella xylostella) for several months, were also all migrant Moths.

My first Diamond-back Moth for several months.

The outside egg trays took a good soaking and so I laid them out on my garden table to dry out in the sunshine. I am hoping to get a new white board to put at the back of my Moth Box as the old one now is looking rather grim and so will be disposed of over the weekend. The Moths recorded this morning were as follows:

 

MACRO MOTHS	MICRO MOTHS
Golden Twin-spot x6	Rusty-dot Pearl x3
Pale Mottled Willow x10	Olive-tree Pearl x7
Shuttle-shaped Dart x3	Light Brown Apple Moth x5
Bright-line Brown-eye x1	Apple Leaf Miner x1
Large Yellow Underwing x19	Mint Moth x1
Lesser Yellow Underwing x2	Common Plume x1
Square-spot Rustic x4	Chevron Grass-moth x1
Clancy’s Rustic x1	Box Tree Moth x1
Garden Carpet x1	Diamond-back Moth x1
L-album Wainscot x9	Tree-mallow Tortrix x1
Buff Ermine x1
Vine’s Rustic x1
Turnip Moth x2
Angle Shades x2

 

Pembroke Road, Old Portsmouth:

The cloud rolled in during my second shift this afternoon.

Though it was a bright start on my first shift in Pembroke Road this morning, there were only 9 species in all seen or heard this morning. To be honest, it was all the usual birds too with nothing really of note yet to be seen here today

Two more species were added to the day list here this afternoon with both Black-headed and Great Black-backed Gull both flying over Pembroke Road during my second shift. The weather was pleasant still with plenty of sunshine until a large bank of high white cloud rolled in from the west, but still remained warm.