Moffat - Mothing and more Sat 30th May 2015

We had set moth traps with the Grey Daggers mothing group the previous evening and met up again at Craigieburn Forest, on the road from Moffat to Selkirk. We were keen to see what we'd caught and identify them.

Despite the sunny conditions, it had been cold overnight and we did not expect a big catch as we gathered to open the traps from all the locations.

 

A few moths were found in the traps near the car park and a small number were found in the traps from higher up the track.

 

 

A list of moths recorded will be posted here once verified.


 From here we headed to the Moffat Community Reserves and had a wander around both reserves to see what else was taking advantage of the sunshine. Moffat Community Reserve is an old quarry. More than 1 million tonnes of sand and gravel were extracted before the land was sold to the Moffat & District Community Nature Trust to turn it into a nature reserve.

As we sat in the first hide there were plenty of sand martins skimming across the water. Their speed is amazing when you watch them for a few minutes. Soon after we set off again we met one of the trustees of the Community Reserve. We had not met him before but he stopped for a chat and told us that he had seen a grasshopper warbler that morning and that there is often an osprey flying overhead. We mentioned that we were hoping to see some damsel flies or butterflies around the reserve in the sunshine but were always happy to see anything on our walks. As we stood talking to him he suddenly spotted something in the sky and on looking through our binoculars - guess what? Yes - an osprey!!!! It was very high in the clouds and without binoculars we probably wouldn't have seen it. What a treat.

Warblers were singing all around

Bugs were abundant

 

Spiders kept dashing across the path

 

Sitting in the new hide the pond was very quiet - except for an oystercatcher and it's brood of fluffy babies.

 

 



Can you see the young oystercatchers?

We did finally see our first butterflies of the day. Two orange/brown ones disappeared before we could identify them but it was impossible not to identify the male Orange tips. A couple of females did finally sit down long enough to see them too.

In a sunny corner of the field we then spotted our first damselflies of the year! Too much of a fleeting glimpse to identify unfortunately - but we had seen them! We did spot a Large Red Damsefly later by the Lochan and this one we finally managed a photo of!

 

Sitting in the main hide having our lunch we found we had company...

wasps were busy building a nest.

Dyke Farm Nature Reserve is right next door to the Community Reserve and we usually walk around both reserves in one visit. Dyke Farm is maintained by the Moffat & District Wildlife Club. Their volunteers have been very over the winter creating paths, clearing out ditches, felling trees etc.

Here are the birds we saw on both reserves:

Blackbird

Blue tit

Canada Goose

Chaffinch

Great tit

House Martin

Little Grebe

Mallard

Mute Swan

Moorhen

Osprey (flying over in the distance)

Oystercatcher, with young

Pheasant

Pied Wagtail

Pied Flycatcher

Robin

Sand Martin

Starling

Swallow

Tufted Duck

Willow Warbler

Wren

 

Think this might be a Clouded Silver moth

 

Whose egg was this?

 

Apparently crows have been eating many of the duck eggs around the reserve. After a very enjoyable walk around the reserves we reached the exit gate to find one last treat -

a cinnabar moth.