This July, Twelve Hills participated in an awesome nation-wide event called National Moth Week, which ran from July 19th to July 27th. You might be asking yourself, what is mothing, anyway?
Mothing, also called blacklighting, is attracting moths and other insects to count, observe on iNaturalist, and document them for scientific study – as well as personal enjoyment. It can be a solo activity, or it can be a group event. The basic setup includes white sheets, black lights or other types of light insects are attracted to, and a camera. Extras include Petri dishes for catching insects that won’t sit still, macro lenses for magnifying the images, and headlamps and flashlights for safety.
This year on July 20th, we held a blacklight mothing event in the evening, co-hosted by TPWD Urban Wildlife Biologist Sam Kieschnick, and invited the neighborhood and our local Texas Master Naturalists. With mothing kits setup throughout the nature preserve, we documented over 200 species that evening, with 100 of them being new for Twelve Hills! This includes moths, beetles, spiders, leafhoppers and treehoppers, and more! Mothing is important for documenting nocturnal wildlife that we don’t typically get to see during the day. Knowing what insects are at the nature center can tell us a lot about the health of the prairie. What do we have that doesn’t belong in our ecoregion? What should we have that we are missing? And what is our overall biodiversity?
If you missed the mothing at Twelve Hills for Moth Week 2025, don’t fret! We’ve got a list of other events around DFW, and we’ll host a second moth night in the fall.
