One stinking moth. That is all that we caught last night.
I had to hustle to beat the ducks to the kiddie pool.
I will continue the experiment. Yesterday evening was breezy. According to Weather Underground the wind dropped down to 2 mph but it was pretty breezy at six in the morning. Low temperature of 68 F.
Maybe the moths were not flying. Maybe the pale blue color of the pool, and the fact that it was illuminated by the light was enough to keep the moths from flying into it.
To be continued....at least until the end of coddling moth and plum curculio season.
I wonder if the problem might be twofold:
ReplyDeletea) The 'cool', rather than incandescent, light.
b) That the 'moon' is a light receiver, rather than a light source.
It might be interesting to try replacing the 'moon' with a 7W clear, incandescent night light bulb suspended from the end of an extension cord.
Obviously, there is much to play with here.
ReplyDeleteI remember enjoying a Blues concert in Old Town Lansing in August. We found a place to sit away from the crowd. The bugs were swarming around mercury vapor lamps (distinct bluish tint). Every couple of minutes the bugs would simply disappear from around one of the light poles.
It later occurred to me that they may have heard a bat homing in on them and dispersed. It makes one wonder if a simple speaker could randomly chirp at bat frequencies and either make bugs go elsewhere or else desensitize them to real predators.
I think our cool nights may have had something to do with our low moth count.
Thanks for writing
-Joe