Crassa unitella

Crassa unitella.  Trapped in Kingswood Glen, 24 July 2012.

Yes, my posts are very moth-oriented recently.  But they are so fascinating, and unexpectedly easy to find.  This one turned up on a night trapping exercise to which I was invited by Ishpi Blatchley, our local bat and lichen expert who has also become interested in them.

Some of them look like illustrations of alien monsters from the covers of science fiction books (or, for the more classically oriented, something from the corner of a triptych by Heironymous Bosch).  Others simply fail to resemble anything you might imagine a living creature could look like, or are just very odd.  This one, with its buff body and yellowish head, stripey antennae and curved palps, has six perfectly good legs, some of them looking quite sturdy, but is still resting on its proboscis like a seventh leg.  The head-down pose is typical of this species.

Here's the trap we used.

Actinic Skinner-type moth trap in Kingswood Glen, 24 July 2012.

Moths love it.  Normally!  We didn't get nearly as many as we expected that night.  There were a huge number of midges and mosquitoes, though.  Mothing has its risks ...