Wednesday June 29 - Testing the tech

 Before I start on today's adventure, I'd like to take you back to last week. Do you remember this?

Shaded Pug

Originally identified as a Shaded Pug, it spent a short time with the label Grey Pug until I showed it to Lee Taylor-Wheal and Bob Cox at the recent HOEF Bioblitz. They were also uncertain about it, but Lee was enthusing about an app called Obsidentify which he had on his phone. We put it to the test, and it concurred with my original thoughts. However, they suggested I run it past David Brown (author of Larger Moths of Warwickshire) just to be sure. David has now confirmed it as a definite Shaded Pug.

This is great news because they are really rare. How rare? Here is a map from 2019 showing all the Warwickshire sites.

Our garden is in the tetrad marked Me.

So that's pretty blooming rare. There are also a few records from the Evesham area, and that could conceivably be the origin of my Pug.

So this morning I headed to Morton Stanley Park on the western edge of Redditch. This large park seemed to cater for both dog-walkers (many), and wildlife. There were several areas of wild grass meadow full of Yellow Rattle and orchids. Presumably deliberately sown, but welcome nonetheless.

I decided to test the app on the orchids. It told me they were Common Spotted Orchids which is what I had thought.

The meadow

Common Spotted Orchid

The best bird I recorded was a Willow Warbler which I think did a bit of mixed singing, although it was mostly normal Willow Warbler song.

As the sun got up and the insects appeared I tested the app. All was going well, no surprises and plenty of hoverflies etc for the record.

Then it threw me a curve ball. A Burnet moth was fluttering through some long grass off Green Lane. I took a photo and asked the app what it decreed. It said Five-spot Burnet. That didn't seem right. I was fairly sure it should only be Narrow-bordered Five-spot Burnet or Six-spot Burnet.

Five-spot Burnet ag

On getting home, I've tried the app on all three images, and have got the same 100% result. But the literature says that there are no confirmed Five-spot Burnet records in the West Midlands, and further reading suggested that it should be a coastal species. 

To be fair to the app, it seems pretty clear that the two species can only really be split with confidence when examining their caterpillars (which differ markedly). Even genitalia identification is regarded as very tricky. I'm just nonplussed that the app was so unequivocal. 

Following a bit more research I can't see any reason to agree with the app, so I'm logging it as a Narrow-bordered Five-spot Burnet.

I think I'm going to have to regard its results with a good deal of caution in future. 

Maybe I'll just use it for plants.