August 3rd 2008

Out mothing with the Bumbling Bears, John Jennings and Stephen Trinder at Ryton Meadows last night and we started well with exceptional scope views of planet Jupiter and three of its moons once we had the traps set up. On high power you could see the dark belts of cloud parallel to its equator and spot on time (22:14pm) the International Space Station flew over. Other spacey highlights included the Milky Way, Stephen pointing out many of the constellation including Cygnus, Aquila, Lyria, Bootes, Ursa Major, and Cassiopeia, Corona Borealis and Hercules and one meteorite with a very long trail.
The mothing went well only marred by the rain at 4pm which made for a very wet finish but luckily it cleared by the time we were ready to take photo’s. I used my new Robinson trap and managed 80+ species of 590+ moths with some micros still to identify and with other catches still to be compiled we may over 1500 moths of 120 species for the night. At least 5 Great-spotted Woodpecker flew out of wood at first light heading towards Ryton Country Park.

Purple Bar

Bordered Beauty

Oak Egger

The Johns getting stuck in at the photo session - the smiling idiot at the front is buddy Dave.

Dave was good enough to pick me up so after a quick shower and a change of clothes we were soon out at Draycote Water enjoying Common Tern 4, Wheatear 2 on farborough bank, Yellow-legged Gull 2 second year and a sub-adult near the sailing club and Buzzard 2 but we did not try to relocate the Whinchat in rainbow corner found an hour earlier and other birds reported here today were Dunlin, Peregrine and Common Sandpiper 11.
Brandon Marsh was quiet so after a fly by Turtle Dove near goose pool, two young Whitethroats on east marsh and 5 Green Sandpiper on teal pool we decided to move on to Ryton Woods as it was warming up and managed one Silver-washed fritillary (first time Dave has seen one at rest), 2 Purple Hairstreaks high up in the oak canopy and a few Gatekeepers, Large Whites and Green-veined White along the main ride. Nuthatch heard and a large group of Bullfinches went past. Back to Dave’s for lunch then rest of day in the land of nod.

Richard