For the first time ever a national colour marking experiment will take place as part of National Moth Night 2009 activities. More than 30 participating sites in England, Scotland, Wales and the Irish Republic will be marking their moth catch in the days leading up to national moth night and we are asking moth recorders and members of the public to look out for these. Click here to see the network of marking locations

These moths bear a spot on either the bottom left or right corner of the wing, or the outer middle edge of the left or right wing. A variety of different colours have been used, including orange, red, pink, purple, grey, blue, yellow, turquoise, green and grey. Marking of moths will begin at the designated locations in the next few days and will continue up to the National Moth Nights, so it is possible that you could see a marked moth either before or after the event. Should you be fortunate enough to see one of these moths please report it as soon as possible to atropos.editor@atropos.info or by phoning 01326 290287, make a note of the date, and take a photograph of the moth to ensure that an accurate colour match can be made and the source location identified. Please do not carry out your own marking experiments as this would cause confusion if a marked moth is retrapped.

Bird ringing has revealed much about the movements of birds within Britain, as well as their migrations overseas, but we know comparatively little about what movements take place within moth populations. We know that immigrant species will travel large distances before reaching Britain, sometimes from as far afield as Africa, but our resident populations are also subject to movement, as records of out of range species show. Of course the chances of getting a retrap away from the site of original marking are slim, but were it to happen then it would be a significant event.

We are fortunate to have the involvement of Rothamsted Research in this experiment, who are themselves carrying out pioneering investigations into moth migration. Rothamsted will be looking for marked moths in their network of moth-traps around the British Isles and using their ongoing monitoring of moth migration using vertical radar to monitor migration activity during National Moth Night.

Radar equipment using to monitor moth migration at Rothamsted Research (Photo copyright: I. Woiwod