Friday 4 July 2014

Not a sighting but advice...

sorry if this is not allowed but I am wondering if anyone ever traps or has trapped with low wattage actinic bulbs and / or black bulb ? are they good at attracting a variety of moths ? thank you.
emma cram

3 comments:

  1. Hi

    I normally use a 15w actinic in my home garden in Buckinghamshire, and I also use it in my parent's garden in Gower; I was there last week and although I still have to plot all my catches, I was getting 50-60 species per night with this bulb (approx 200 moths; last year on one night I had nearly 300 moths of 85 species with the same bulb). The two nights I used an MV I was getting twice as many moths, of 70+ species, although a lot of the higher number of moths was taken by Heart & Dart and Dark Arches!

    One day in 2012 (in Bucks) I ran an MV and a 15W actinic adjacent to each other, with similar results (295/65 vs 117/48) and it was noticeable that there were some species that came to the actinic and not the MV.

    Hope this helps!

    Dave

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  2. For a couple of years I used to run a 125 watt black MV on my garden trap. It pulled in more moths than the 6 watt actinic I would otherwise have been using, but almost certainly less that a 125 watt white lamp would have. The main drawback I found was the price of the lamps and their ridiculously short service life. I tried two lamps and neither lasted much more than a year. I always keep a record of trap on and off times so I was able to work out the total burn time of each lamp and neither managed more than 200 hours, which is pretty poor. I believe it is the thick Woods glass envelope that shortens their life, by hindering the cooling of the lamp, leading to overheating. I now use a 22 watt circular, green actinic and it pulls in as many moths and species as the black MV, if not more.

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  3. And just to say, of course it's ok to ask for advice on the blog - just try to keep it mothy if possible!

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