WHILE out for a walk recently in Croft Road, Holsworthy, local resident Peter Parrish found an unusual moth on the fence, writes Christine Williams.

He returned to Abbeyfield, where he lives, and consulted fellow residents Lorna Higgs and Fred Nute who have a fascination for wildlife.

When Sue Lyle arrived with her phone she took a photo, and after some research they came to the conclusion it was a ‘Death’s-Head Hawkmoth’.

The Death’s-Head Hawkmoth gets its name from the skull-like mark on its thorax and, because of its unusual markings, it is not surprising that people once considered it a bad omen.

The following day Sue said: “Flying into apartments in the evening at times it extinguishes the light; foretelling war, pestilence, hunger, death to man and beast.

“That makes some gruesome reading about the moth and last night I slept with my window shut!”

However, she was reassured when in view of the distinctive pink and black barring on the body of the moth they came to the conclusion that it was more likely to be a less fearsome ‘Privet Hawkmoth’.