A passion for moths – and the thrill of the chase

Over the years, I too have regularly been meeting with moths. So far, I have encountered 891 species just in my own garden in Sussex. But most of these moths came to me: I have an ancient metal Robinson trap, inherited from my grandfather, which lures them to a mercury vapour bulb. Katty Baird, how-ever, despises ‘all-too-easy light traps’. (‘One of my most rewarding experiences with a moth trap was at an old people’s home…’) She is proactive, even hyperactive, in seeking out her quarry across East Lothian, ranging from moorland cliffs and caves to the ‘car park toilet block near my children’s primary school’. Meetings with Moths, by an ‘extreme moth-er’, makes me feel like a decadent southerner, bloated on the relatively huge hauls in my part of the world.

We are alike, though, in our passionate love for these often maligned insects. Moths are seen as drab at best; at worst, sinister, flying by night and secretly gnawing holes in cashmere jumpers. But more than 2,500 wildly diverse species of moth have been recorded in Britain and only two of these have larvae which are likely to consume your jerseys.  There are plenty of blatantly beautiful moths out there, such as the blotched velvet Garden Tiger, which has blue-spotted scarlet or yellow underwings, or the Merveille du Jour, which is indeed marvellous, marbled mint-green, silver and black. As Baird acknowledges, most moths are not vivid ‘eye-candy’, like the ‘marshmallow pink’ Elephant Hawkmoth; but even those that are predominantly brown or silvery grey have wonderfully intricate and delicate patterns in their fine-sculpted wings. Baird is especially good at evoking these subtler beauties, such as the multiple fine cross-bands on the wings of a Mallow moth, which are a confection of many shades of brown: ‘a darker central stripe shaded in hazelnut, chocolate and cinnamon, sandwiched between lighter bands of milky coffee and caramel.