Species Account

Select species and region:

Distribution

Summary Data

Season (Adult / Immature):

National Status: Migrant

Local Status: Very rare migrant.

Local Record: Grade 4 See here for explanation

Flight time: Jul-Aug.

Forewing: 11-13mm.

Foodplant: Creeping Thistle.

IMPORTANT - Please note that the maps and accounts are provisional, subject to change and further update. The whole dataset still needs to go through the final verification process and it is likely that a very small number of records will not satisfy the present requirements and there are other records that have not been formally submitted. The information is for guidance only.

Record breakdown:

	VC9	Region
Year first recorded	2004	2004
Year last recorded	2009	2009
Number of records	3	6
Number of individuals	3	6
Unique positions	2	4
Unique locations	2	4
Adult records	3	6
Immature records	0	0

For the region, we have a total of 6 records from 4 sites. Earliest record on file is in 2004.

Photos

Species Account

For further information refer UK Moths.

Davey, P., 2009: First recorded in Britain in 2001; however, this specimen was not positively identified until 2004, when in the summer of that year a further twenty-two examples appeared across mainly south-western counties of England. This exquisite moth is resident in the Mediterranean and the north African regions, the larva feeding on the flowers and seedheads of carline thistle (Carlina vulgaris). The four Dorset (light trap) records are: West Bexington, on 31 August 2005 (Dr J Clarke), Portland, on 9 and 10 August 2004 (M Cade), Cheyne Weare, on 20 August 2001 (G Senior). All are likely to have originated from the region of the western Mediterranean.

This species is rather similar to Purple Marbled²⁴⁰⁷. Diagnostics include: the absence of a dark basal streak; median line sharply angled as it approaches costal edge.

See background to species accounts. Index of Vernacular names - Search - Random Species