Mythimna pallens
In 3 days ~20% in a week ~40%
Mythimna pallens, the common wainscot, is a moth of the family Noctuidae distributed throughout the Palearctic realm from Ireland in the west, through Europe (all of Russia) to Central Asia and Amur to the Kuriles in the east. The species was first described by Carl Linnaeus in his 1758 10th edition of Systema Naturae.
As with other "wainscots", this species has buffish-yellow forewings with prominent venation. The common wainscot, as the specific name suggests, is very pale, lacking the darker markings shown by most of its relatives. The hindwings are pure white.
The wingspan is 32–40 mm. Forewing yellowish ochreous, often with a rufous tinge; veins pale, defined by grey-brown streaks, and with similar streaks in the intervals; dark spots on veins 2 and 5 beyond middle; hindwing white, grey at centre, the veins dark; — ab. ectypa Hbn. Is the form in which the red tints are strongest; in arcuata Stph. the hindwing shows a complete row of dark dots on the veins. See also Hacker et al.
Mythimna impura is difficult to certainly distinguish from its congeners. See Townsend et al. Mythimna straminea (Treitschke, 1825) Mythimna... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wadden Sea National Park | 🇩🇪 Germany |
More parks will be added in future updates.
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Liverpool | 🇬🇧 United Kingdom | |
| 2 | London | 🇬🇧 United Kingdom | |
| 3 | Birmingham | 🇬🇧 United Kingdom | |
| 4 | Berlin | 🇩🇪 Germany | |
| 5 | Prague | 🇨🇿 Czechia |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Common Wainscot sighting in Wadden Sea National Park on a given day, based on 32 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 234th most-seen of the 818 insects we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 20%, and over a week to about 40%, if each day is a fresh chance.
June and August–September
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Common Wainscot in Wadden Sea National Park on a given day, against under 5% in July and October–May, the lowest months.
Between 6 and 9 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Common Wainscot sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Wadden Sea National Park, in our data
Wadden Sea National Park is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Common Wainscot sightings: about 10% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
Same genus: Mythimna
The closest relatives of the Common Wainscot that you can see in Wadden Sea National Park (genus Mythimna) are The Clay (about 10%), Southern Wainscot (about 10%) and Smoky Wainscot (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Common Wainscot is recorded against all the insects logged in Wadden Sea National Park (32 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
