Identification

Unmistakable.

Recording Method.

Attracted to light, also comes to sugar and flowers.

Life cycle

Two overlapping generations. Overwinters as a pupa underground. Larvae are present July to September, hiding by day and feeding at night.

Larval foodplants

Mainly Bracken and ferns.

Habitat

Woodland, heathland, moorland and gardens.

History

Lennon (1863) had stated it was common in his ‘List of Lepidoptera taken near Dumfries.’ K. J. Morton of Edinburgh (1900) while on a visit in July 1899 to Wigtownshire had found this species in the Monreith area. Gordon (1913) had stated it to be common and generally distributed in Wigtownshire, finding it common at sugar in woods around Corsemalzie. It also came to rhododendron blossom. Earliest date was 5th June 1911.

Sir Arthur Duncan (1909-84) during his lifetime had found it at Closeburn, Tynron and Castlehill, Dumfries (all VC72).

At Irvine House Lodge, Auchenrivock, a fine series was trapped in 1974. Then, from 1974 to 1990 all seven Rothamsted stations contributed seventy records between them, showing it to be widespread.

Regular trapping at Kirkton, Durisdeer, Cally Woods, Kirkcudbright and Old Torr, provided quite a number of the 320 records during this period, with the rest from scattered sites across the region, but very few from Wigtownshire.