Thursday, 12 September 2013

Painted Lady - an unexpected visitor to the moth trap

It's a rare event for me to catch a butterfly in the moth trap, I can recall a couple of occasions when Red Admirals have been amongst the moth catch on a morning so I was very surprised to find this Painted Lady in the trap this morning. 
The trap was switched on after dark and off around dawn so it most have been flying during the hours of darkness. This probably isn't that surprising for such a highly migratory species. 

Numbers recorded in Derbyshire fluctuate markedly from year to year, it can be quite scare in some years and abundant in others. It is not a migrant strictly speaking as individuals which do arrive in the UK from continental Europe or even North Africa will not return southwards although some of their progeny might.

Painted Lady

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