My hobby – perhaps obsession would be a better word – makes every morning thrilling. The excitement is as intense as the Christmases I remember from childhood: I never know what the trap will hold. And looking at moths keeps alive that childhood sense of pure wonder.

If the beauty of moths makes their study aesthetically rewarding, their sheer diversity makes it ecologically significant as well.

There is even one moth, the wax moth, whose larvae can consume and digest plastic bags.