2020 May 23

 

   Jeremy Tatum writes:  I tried to look for the Field Crescent today, without success.  The field on West Saanich Road about a km north of Stelly’s Cross Road next to the cemetary, where there was a big colony of the butterfly, was, as Ron pointed out late last year, totally destroyed.  Eddy’s storage now has a large number of gigantic trailers and other vehicles parked there, and the area is obviously now very much disturbed.  I don’t think we are going to see Field Crescents there again.  I don’t know of anywhere else in the southern Vancouver Island birdwatching area where they occur.  We may have lost this one.

 

Jochen Möhr’s moths from Metchosin this morning:

 

1 Egira rubrica

1 Eupithecia cretaceata

1 Hydriomena sp.

1 Lacinipolia cuneata/pensilis 

2 Tyria jacobaeae

1 Xanthorhoe defensaria

and an unknown ichneumonid pictured from above and below.

 

Eupithecia cretaceata (Lep.: Geometridae)  Jochen Möhr

Xanthorhoe defensaria (Lep.: Geometridae)  Jochen Möhr

     Jeremy Tatum writes: In an earlier version of this posting, I had confidently labelled Jochen’s next photograph as Lacinipolia pensilis.  Since then, Jeremy Gatten, Libby Avis and I have had some discussion, and we have concluded that L. pensilis and L. cuneata are not the easiest moths in the world to distinguish!  For the time being I am relabelling this moth and the one from May 22 as L. cuneata/pensilis, putting cuneata first to indicate that we think this is the more likely for both photographs.

Lacinipolia cuneata/pensilis (Lep.: Noctuidae)  Jochen Möhr

Hydriomena marinata/californiata, (Lep.: Geometridae)  Jochen Möhr

   Jeremy Tatum writes:  Ichneumonids are notoriously difficult to identify.  I am going to label this one “probably” Ophion luteus, but maybe “probably” is a bit optimistic, and perhaps I should write “possibly”.

Probably Ophion luteus (Hym.: Ichneumonidae)  Jochen Möhr

Probably Ophion luteus (Hym.: Ichneumonidae)  Jochen Möhr