TRANSACTIONS THE STRIPED HAWK AND OTHER LEPIDOPTERA RECORDED IN SUFFOLK DĂœRING 1974 BARON DE W O R M S
As a contrast to the fine summer of 1973, that of 1974 was extremely cool and unsettled and there was a general consensus of opinion that there was a distinct dearth of both butterflies and moths throughout most of the British Isles. However, Suffolk seems to have kept to its usual Standard of very choice and even rare species during the year under review. Undoubtedly the most notable capture for the year was a Striped Hawk Moth (Celerio livornica Esp.) which graced the moth-trap of Mr. William Storey at his home near Great Bealings on the night of August 14th. So far as I am aware, it is the only record of this well-known and spectacular migrant for the whole of Great Britain during 1974. It is also a very rare visitor to the Eastern Counties, though plentiful sometimes in the south and western regions as in 1943 and 1949. Up tili 1937 the late Claude Morley only has three records for the County in 1904 and 1931, but in that famous year, 1943, at least half a dozen Striped Hawks were taken or seen but hardly any have been noted since then in Suffolk. Another most remarkable sighting was that of what would certainly appear to have been a Bath White (Pontia daplidice Linn.) which settled on a flower of mignonette in a ride in a forest at Coldharbour, Didlington. The fortunate observer was Miss Vivien Leather. That eminent naturalist, Mr. Ted Ellis, reported this record in the Eastern Daily Press and notes that not only was the date, June 20th, just right for this rare migrant butterfly but that it was a female which seems to have been trying to lay on its natural foodplant Reseda lutea. Morley reports three Bath Whites in the last Century seen in Suffolk and Ted Ellis says that the last record of it in the County was in 1912. It would seem that none visited Suffolk in that record year of 1945 which saw a huge invasion of this species mainly in Devon and Cornwall. As in 1973, Mr. Alfred Waller has revisited his family home at Waldringfield and ran a mercury-vapour light there in late June, 1974, but without such spectacular results as in the previous year. However, on the 27th he saw a worn Alder Kitten (Harpyia bicuspis Borkh.), his only record of this very local moth of which he noted over a dozen in 1973. A good night on June 29th produced among a large assortment the White Satin Moth (Stilpnotia salicis Linn.), a large female of this fairly common moth which