For our first indoor meeting of the new season we were delighted to welcome Ben Smart for a talk about his stunning new book about the moths of Lancashire.
It was an excellent turnout, but if you didn’t make it to the meeting, click on the ‘Continue Reading’ button to find a link to Ben’s slides, which he has kindly allowed us to share.
With Steve Palmer, Ben has recently written a reference book with descriptions, photos, maps, flight times, caterpillar photos (where available) and foodplant lists for each of the county’s 1570 species. The definition of Lancashire used includes most of Greater Manchester (north of the Mersey), so contains Rochdale.
As Ben is from Rochdale, and his parents still live here, many of the records and photos are taken within the borough. An example is Elachista poae, a scarce micro-moth species within the county, but whose caterpillar he has found leaf-mining Sweet Canary-grass at Mandale Park, and along the Rochdale Canal from Deeplish to Littleborough.
Here is the link to the powerpoint slides: The Moths of Lancashire 2024 talk
Ben also recommended a couple of excellent online resources to help with moth identification, both of which are on our Links page