The temperature has plummeted in the last few days, and overnight was just five degrees. Only a fool would put their moth trap out in such conditions, unless of course he was doing the garden moth survey and was bound to the date.
In fact I was pleasantly surprised to find several moths and no wasps in the trap. The moths comprised only three species; 12 Lunar Underwings, two Large Yellow Underwings, and a Shuttle-shaped Dart.
There was also some by-catch. This means insects that are not moths. Keen entomologists would be getting their microscopes and killing jars out and identifying everything. I am not that kind of insect identifier. I prefer to glance at them and say "big orange caddisfly (looks vaguely familiar), large Cranefly (looks very familiar), Gnat (not interested)".
However a fly resting on the window did look unfamiliar, and my interest was piqued enough to photograph it (though not to measure it, to my cost).
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| Soldierfly (Sargus bipunctatus or S flavipes) |
The Twitter community are great. Between them they know everything, and I got some responses suggesting it was a Soldierfly (possibly Sargus sp). This massive leg-up led me to check the relevant groups and realise they were quite right. Two common ones have yellow legs, S flavipes and S bipunctatus. One is twice the size of the other.
I should have measured it.
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