Moth collectors?

I was outside lastnight in the pitch dark playing with my new L4. All of a sudden, I had moths flying around, trying to get really close to the head of the flashlight. Turn it off, they fly away, turn it back on, they come back /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/poke2.gif

It was interesting, never had that experience before outside, but sometimes use a flashlight and a bottle to catch them when they're inside the house rather than smearing them all over the walls /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/twakfl.gif

I used to be an entomologist at the Federal Building in Juneau AK, but the moth population in Juneau was nothing to write home about. :/
And we didn't have L4s or any other LED flashlights back then either, so I have little practical experience in catching them or having them attracted to lights that way. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif

The biggest and flashiest moths we had were the daytime-flying sphinx moths. They were pretty uncommon, but not rare or endangered by any means. They seemed to hang around places where wild clover was flowering.
A picture of one can be found here if you like.

Craig,

I have a pic somewhere of a sphinx moth parked on the side of my shack out near Landers, with a wingspan over 4 inches! I rarely name pics, but that one is "Mothra." /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif They are very colorful.

Larry

I've had a sphinx moth in a plastic container for 5 - 6 years and it still looks good as new. Caught it while I was at my grandmothers house. She had alot of creepy crawlies around. I hated the spiders... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/faint.gif

No, but I had an AWESOME bunch of fleas in a medicine bottle of water. (I got a BIG kick out of watching them drawn!).

Then the whirlwind came through cleaning up and tossed them. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif