On the evening of the 25th July, Nicola, Myself and Andrew Cunningham headed out to Parke, a NT owned estate near Bovey Tracey on the edge of the moor. It was a Devon Moth Group event and after a hot day we were hoping there might be some good mothing to be had. We met up with NT ranger Fred Hutt and the guvnor of Devon mothing Roy (the nailer) Mcormick and headed down to the river with a small group of lepidopterists and out into one of the fields were Roy already had two portable traps set out.

Whilst waiting for it to get dark I had a wander around as the site looked like it might have potential for araneus angulatus, sadly none found, but araneus quadratus and araneus marmoreus var pyrimadatus meant it wasn't too shabby on the orb weaver front, even if one margin of the field was solid with himalayan balsam.

Once it did get dark, the mothing started in earnest with slow trickle of moths, vastly outnumbered by swarms of diptera and a fair few caddis flies. Royal Mantle, a galium botherer, was the first cracker of the night, proudly announced by young Tim Stripp, a thirteen year old lepidoptera genius who'se obviously inherited the moth-er gene from his mother Sam.

Other pretty if commoner moths, included elephant, slender brindle, female ghost, beautiful hook tip, brussels lace, antler moth, dark spectacled, peach blossom, and Andrew pointed out a distinctive caddisfly mystacides longicornis with elbowed palps and patterned wings its one of the few field identificable jobs.

A squawk from one of the ladies present was caused by one of the chunkiest long-horns I've ever seen crawling up her back, Nicola suggested Tanner beetle which was backed up later - here's a photograph the next day before it was repatriated:-

However the high point of the event, late on in the night, was Tim Stripp potting a moth on the edge of the trap, and then, rather than the immediate and confident identification, a look of puzzlement, followed by an uncertain "I don't know what this is", That was almost as much of a suprise as him handing it to me in the hope that I might, I had a look, thought, that's smart, but I have no idea what it was and hot-potatoed it to Andrew, who, looked at it, looked at it some more, shrugged and handed it to Roy. Roy said.. "I know this, its a rare migrant, but I can't remember its name, ringed.. something' 'I haven't seen it' (Roy's been mothing since for-ever, so this had to be a good moth) "Ringed Border" .

A frantic bit of speed-googling and Ringed Border Stegania cararia (probably a first for Devon) was confirmed..