Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a hummingbird hawk-moth – a rare visitor to the UK seen in a Thurso garden
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A Thurso resident talked about the "fantastic feeling" of being able to find and watch a "fabulous insect" feeding from flowers in his garden – a hummingbird hawk-moth.
Husband and wife, Steven and Amanda Buttress, are proud of their bee-friendly garden but got more than they bargained for when they sighted a huge moth that they originally believed to be a bird.
"It has been feeding on nectar rich plants in my garden for the past two days (July7/8) but only in the sunshine," said Steven.
"At first when I saw it I thought it was a small hummingbird, especially with its prominent eyes, but then realised that could not be not possible in Caithness. I called to my wife Amanda to come and look and we watched it in awe hovering and fluttering on one of our valerian plants less than a foot away from us – it felt magical."
When the couple went back inside they immediately started looking on the Internet and found the unusual creature to be a hummingbird hawk moth, usually found in southern Europe and America.
From his research Steven found that over the last few summers there have been more and more sightings in the UK. "Unusually for a moth it flies during the day rather than in the dark. We also discovered reference to this moth during the D-Day landings when a swarm was seen flying over the English Channel. This was seen as a lucky omen and they are associated with good luck."
Steven said that his green-fingered wife Amanda grows many plants and shrubs that attract a variety of unusual species including dragonflies. "The garden is usually teaming with bees and insects but this visitor was special and we feel very privileged to have witnessed it so close."
The similarity between the hummingbird hawk-moth and hummingbirds is believed to be a result of convergent evolution wherein two species belong to separate families and having no apparent relation with each other develop to be very similar. This is called homoplasy, which is the copying of physical structures, which appear to be are functionally the same.
The hummingbird hawk-moth migrates to the UK from Southern Europe each year. It can be seen hovering over flowers, feeding with its long proboscis; its wings move so quickly that it makes a humming sound.
Moths like this one are not dangerous to human beings as they do not sting or bite.
