Following in the footsteps of Alice Blanche Balfour to record moths at Whittingehame
If you had some space to display a small selection of moths from your local area, which species would you choose? The most colourful? Your favourites? The commonest? Drawers of insect specimens A selection of East Lothian moths Following a brief visit last year which I documented in a previous blog, I recently had the …
About a year after I embarked on the task, I can finally report that I have entered the moth records from Alice's notebook into an Excel spreadsheet. Phew! Still some work to tidy it up into a more usable format, but I feel a small sense of achievement. Entries in Alice's interesting historic notebook (left) …
Which moths did Alice find out and about in East Lothian in January, and are they still to be found in 2020? In the museum's box file containing her diary is a small soft-backed notebook. Each page has been devoted to a month of the year and lists some species of moth to look out …
What would it have been like to have been invited to tea with Alice Balfour? From the no doubt variously biased accounts I have read she sounds slightly formidable, at times single minded, but maybe sometimes a little lacking in confidence. Nieces speak fondly of her; sisters-in-law less so. She was surrounded by successful and …
Equinox. Equal night. The date when day length and night length are equal? Actually not quite for us in the UK. It is the point in time when the position of the sun is directly above the celestial equator. This year the autumnal equinox was 0850h on 23rd September, when we in East Lothian were …
Although she doesn't appear to have strayed much beyond her corner of East Lothian, Alice's moth hunting endeavours were not confined to Whittingehame. Her specimens and notebooks indicate a few favourite haunts beyond the Estate, perhaps based on ease of access, knowing the landowner or promise of exciting discovery (considerations which are all still relevant …
Rediscovering the moths of Whittingehame 