Author: Pholodes

Winter Moths #3.

With nights finally starting to be a little milder it was time to fire up the moth light to see what was on the wing. Not very much as it turned out, only about twenty moths in total. Sorama bicolor has featured here on more than one occasion, the larvae feed on eucalypt foliage, and with twenty one eucs of fifteen species in the front garden it is not surprising that it is a frequent visitor to the light, eight on this occasion.

Flight records for Gastrina cristaria, (Nacophorini), start in July and August, reaching a peak in November, they seem to be well under way now with half a dozen coming in. This was a very fresh nicely marked male.

This female Epyaxa subidaria, (Larentiinae) was also a nice specimen.

Moths in the genus Chrysodeixis have been numerous, corresponding with quite a bit of tomato damage last season, here is one of the culprits, C. eriosoma.

Finally a nicely marked small Tortricid, probably an Acropolitis species.

Horizontal shots will enlarge.

Winter Moths #2

An early arrival at the light was this female Entometer fervens, (Lasiocampidae) MOV 1 shows no flight records in June and July so she must have been making up for lost time. She fluttered about on the concrete for some time and the first image shows that she scattered eggs.  At packing up time she was carefully placed on a nearby shrub.

Fluttering up the sheet.

Of interest was the second home record of Oxycanus australis (Hepialidae), a species that has not been encountered in all the many previous bush sessions. The longer antennae pectination visible in the images help to distinguish the species from Oxycanus dirempta where the rami are much shorter. Reference Moths of Victoria Volume 6.

Two Microdes have come in, Microdes squamulata (Larentiinae) first, June is noted as a lesser flight month.

The other, Microdes oriochares is described in Moths of Victoria Volume 3 as being of alpine and sub alpine distribution, with flight months December and January. In May 2013 records were made at home, and this June it has turned up again, interesting.