OUR RECORDS
We are actively involved in conserving, restoring, improving and protecting Pensychnant's
natural environment and biodiversity. We aim to observe, record and further understand the diverse species found within the special ecosystem of our Nature Reserve.
Our aim is to build a list of all the wildlife that shares Pensychnant with us... but in the process help people to appreciate and understand our wildlife, be it plant, insect, fungus, bird, or whatever.
Cofnod is our Local Environmental Records Centre and the home of wildlife data for North Wales. We find that their Online Recording System (ORS) is an easy way for us to enter and store our wildlife data. Please add to this when you can by recording your observations of wildlife at Pensychnant using the link below.
As of the beginning of 2025 Cofnod said we had 29,916 environmental records
- can you help increase this?
These records were made up of 1,719 different species - yours might just be a new one!
Featured Wildlife
Clifden Nonpareil
(Catocala fraxini)
On 6th September 2020 Julian trapped this impressive moth - the first record of this species for North Wales. The North Wales Pioneer reported this at the time and Julian is quoted - “This is an impressive moth, indeed its name is French for ‘without equal or unsurpassed’. It has caused quite a stir amongst the local naturalists, with many coming to see it at Pensychnant. It is an immigrant, probably from Eastern Europe. It has never before been recorded in North Wales.”
Weaver's Wave
(Idea contiguaria)
Ashworth's Rustic
(Xestia ashworthii)
The heaths, rich in invertebrates, are the best-known location to see two rare moths, Ashworth’s Rustic and Weaver’s Wave, which occur here in the mountains of North Wales and nowhere else in the world. In Victorian times there was tourist trade in Penmaenmawr based on collectors travelling to catch (and later pin) these moths. Now people will travel from all over Britain to see them when they fly in July.
Black Poplar
(Populus nigra)
THE RAREST TREE
There are estimated to be about 7000 Black Poplars in Britain, making it one of UK's rarest native tree species. Pensychnant has three - a massive male planted in 1870's and two females cloned from a tree in Dyserth in about 2010. In May 2025 urged on by Richard Brunstrom, we hand pollinated one of the female trees with pollen from a tree in Bodlondeb. By the end of May, the fluffy seeds for which Black Poplars are renowned had developed and were harvested. Six days later the first seedlings germinated. Black Poplars are rare, but Black Poplar seedlings are vanishingly rare. Seeds must be rare because female trees are rare: there are only 5 known females in North Wales. And even if seed devoloped, the chance of seedling establishment is minimal because the seeds have tiny cotyledons, so cannot cope with competition. These may be the first Black Poplar seedlings in North Wales for hundreds of years. In only 150 years they'll be big.