National Moth Night 7 June

From Neil Gregory...

Just a reminder that National Moth Night is happening this Saturday. We would be very grateful for any records you may have from day-time observations and night time trappings. Please contact your local moth recorder with your records. Below is a message from the National Moth Night team with a little more information:

"Once again National Moth Night (organised by Atropos and Butterfly Conservation) is upon us and this year we are celebrating its 10th anniversary. Even more reason to go out into your gardens and the wider countryside to record moths!

For 2008, NMN includes a daytime element and a change from the normal macro-moth only list of targets with the inclusion of both micro-moth and habitat targets, respectively Anania funebris and Orchards; the macro-moth targets being Bordered Gothic (Heliophobus reticulata) and Narrow-bordered bee Hawk-moth (Hemaris tityus).

It is recognised the target species and habitat will not be in the reach of every recorder or public event; however, the NMN team do encourage recorders and event co-ordinators to allocate their own local targets of interest, an ideal opportunity to do so.

For 2008, we strongly encourage the use of the revamped NMN data submission form and the new NMN recording template forms (Microsoft Office and Sun Systems OpenOffice formats) which will be made available from the NMN website (www.nationalmothnight.info) for the event until the end of the year. Along with a short questionnaire, the data submission form gives provision for recorders to attach the NMN recording templates, MapMate `Sync' files (in preference to submission via the MapMate Web Server) or any other suitable data format (visit the NMN website for further details).

On behalf of the National Moth Night team, thank you for your continued support for the event and let's hope for good weather and a bumper crop of moths!

Regards, Les Hill.Data manager, National Moth Recording Scheme