After a break from sampling, our faculty adviser collected some data at his house this past weekend. He intended to run a two hour trial, but about 90 minutes into the sampling the halogen bulb died. Overall, there were a lot more moths present that there have been on previous dates.
On this last day of May We are very proud to say That the sampling we did today Went decidedly okay. Tonight we saw decent moth turnout, with a total of four moths split evenly between the two lamps. Of course, it's nothing conclusive as of yet, but it looks like the number of moths is increasing - (hopefully) a sign that in weeks to come, we'll be able to collect really good data. Miscellaneous Info: Humidity: 62% Pressure: 30.25 in UV Index: 0 Cloud Cover: 0% Ceiling: 34100 ft Dew Point: 45° F Visibility: 10 mi Temperature: 57 F Wind: 5 mph Sunset: 8:20pm Moon phase: waxing crescent Today we had another night of sampling, which was unfortunately truncated after about an hour because of rain. There were only three moths outside, two on the halogen and one on the mercury vapor. None of them stayed for a long time. The lack of conclusive data leads us to believe that it will be virtually impossible to obtain really significant differences until temperatures warm up and more moths are active. Miscellaneous Info: Humidity: 82% Pressure: 29.93 in UV Index: 0 Cloud Cover: 100% Ceiling: 6558 ft Dew Point: 54° F Visibility: 4 mi Sunset: 8:13 pm Wind speed: 5 mph Waning crescent Tonight we are sampling in the same location as last time. This time, however, there weren't as many moths or insects in general. We had one moth on the halogen lamp stand that stayed for a while, and we had one on the mercury vapor lamp stand that flew away after a few minutes. We hypothesize that this lack of moths might be caused by the weather, for it is about 10 degrees cooler than last time when we had more moths. Miscellaneous Info: Pressure: 30.10 in Visibility: 10.0 miles Clouds: Clear Dew Point: 44 °F Humidity: 65% Sunrise 5:38 AM Sunset 8:06 PM Moon Waning Gibbous No Wind 54.5 °F After yesterday's inclement weather I wasn't sure what to expect when I took the mothing stands out of my garage and set up the lamps. I got really excited when there was a moth on the mercury vapor stand just seconds after I turned on the light. Although there was no huge influx of moths, there were some moths which is A LOT better than last time! I noticed that the mercury vapor lamp attracts a lot of bugs in general, while the halogen lamp barely attracts any other insects. Overall, the halogen lamp attracted fewer moths than the mercury vapor lamp. Miscellaneous Info: - sunset: 8:01 pm - moon phase: waxing gibbous - temperature: 68.9° F - wind speed: 1 mph - humidity: 50% - cloud cover: clear - dew point: 50° F Today we planned to sample again, this time at the other student's house. Unfortunately we were forced to cancel our sampling because of inclement weather. There was a 40% change of thunderstorms all night starting late afternoon and it had been raining on and off. Since the lamps aren't allowed to get wet, sampling wasn't worth the risk. I still set up the stands and the sheets in between patches of rain. (The lamps were left inside, don't worry.) I put the PVC stands with the sheets in my garage completely assembled, so that when I go to sample again tomorrow I don't have to go through the effort of setting them up. The moth above was found on my wall after the mothing attempt. It had snuck inside when I was going in and out. I thought I would take its picture, for it was the first time I had a moth to photograph since the start of this experiment.
Today just one of us set up the stands, given yesterday's miserable turnout. Nothing much happened, probably because we used the same sampling times as yesterday. We intend to work out a better sampling period as of next week so we can (hopefully) collect real data. Miscellaneous Info: - sunset: 7:54 pm - moon phase: crescent - temperature: 61 F - wind speed: 9 mph - humidity: 54% - cloud cover: 50% - dew point: 43 F Photos: Today was our first day of 'data collection'. We set up the stands at a team member's house. They sat on the lawn, shining forth like great beacons of hope. Except not really hope, since there weren't very many insects out - save for a few mosquitoes and some giant other thing. (We're not sure what it was...) Miscellaneous Info About Tonight: - sunset: 7:53 pm - moon phase: crescent - temperature: 59 F - wind speed: 6 mph - humidity: 41% - cloud cover: 25% - ceiling: 27,000 ft - dew point: 36 F And now for some photos: Slightly aggravatingly, about twenty minutes after taking the stands down, just as we were both going our separate ways (i.e. one of us was heading home), we saw moths outside. We might adjust sampling time tomorrow and see what happens.
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