Getting my stripes

Since I started a separate mothing blog, I rarely feature moths on my St Margaret's Photo Diary. Today is an exception, because I have long wanted to find a Striped Hawk Moth in my trap in the morning.

With the winds having a good southerly component it had occured to me that a decent migrant might arrive, I even thought that it was about time I caught a Striped Hawk-moth. This made it slightly surreal when I looking into my MV trap and the only moth immediately visible was indeed a Striped Hawk-moth in pristine condition.

This species in common in the Mediterranean region and North Africa and in favourable conditions can become very numerous there. The individuals that occur in the UK are migrants, but have probably not originated from as far as N Africa, but are the off-spring of migrants that moved further north in Europe earlier in the year.

The size of this Hawk-moth is quite variable, having a wingspan between 60mm and 85mm, but the colour and pattern seems to be fairly constant. They can be quite active during the day, normally flying towards the evening and can be found nectaring at sweet smelling flowers.

I quite like this picture showing its amazing "eye-lashes".