There are about 2 500 species of moth in Britain, compared to only 70 species of butterfly. To make identifying them slightly easier, moths are split in to two categories: macro-moths represent the larger species and micro-moths, the smaller species.

I previously blogged about a beautiful green carpet moth I found in the woods, which is classified as a macro-moth. This is an example of a micro-moth, found by one of our school visits who were bug hunting in the woods. It is only 5mm long, but makes up for it in looks!

Due to their small size, micro-moths can be a bit of a pain to identify but the broad gold bands on the metallic purple body, make this one particularly striking. Even so, it doesn’t have a common name so is just known by the Latin Micropterix aureatella.

It is a day-flying moth so is seen on warm sunny days feeding on the pollen of plants. They are fairly common so you may even see one in your garden.

Bye for now,

Rhian – Seasonal Ranger