2019 December 2

 

Jochen Möhr writes from Metchosin:

   In the last two mornings, I had no customers on my wall any more.  

I started daily recordings on May 8, 2019.  So here is the summary for the season.

Total # of species recorded: 148

	May	June	July	August	September	October	November
	08 – 31	01 – 30	01 – 31	01 – 31	01 – 30	01 – 31	01 – 30
# of observations	244	140	584	350	374	128	159
# of species	41	41	73	50	36	22	9
% of total # of species	28	28	49	34	24	15	6

 

But this morning, December 2, Jochen writes:

 

Looks like I am back in business:  This morning 3 Operophtera sp.

 

   So…, the question arises, writes Jeremy Tatum, which Operophtera?   Is it the European  O. brumata?   Or the native O. occidentalis (formerly lumped with O. bruceata)?  They are all very well patterned.  O. brumata  is often quite plain, but by no means all of them are. I cannot be 100 percent sure of any of these three, but my best guess is that the first two are probably brumata, while I think the third has a good claim to be O. occidentalis.

 

   Jochen’s are from Metchosin.  I wonder what species one gets in other rural areas, such as Highlands.

Operophtera (probably brumata) (Lep.: Geometridae)   Jochen Möhr

 

Operophtera (probably brumata) (Lep.: Geometridae)   Jochen Möhr

 

Operophtera (probably occidentalis) (Lep.: Geometridae)   Jochen Möhr