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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

Funded international workshop - please repost! 📍 Alter do Chão, Pará 📅 8–11 December 2026 Join other interdisciplinary researchers from UK & Brazil to explore the integration of ancestral and innovative technologies for monitoring Amazonian Sociobiodiversity. Funded by the British Council.

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Huge thanks to my supervisors at UCL, Profs. Jan Axmacher and Simon Lewis, for their support across this project and beyond. And also to our fantastic Congolese collaborators Dr. Anthelme Tsoumou and Paul Loubaki for their immense support. Can't wait to share more of our hard work soon!

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Still, the distinctive structure of these communities poses a question on the ecological importance of insect herbivores in the peat swamp forest, and the functional contribution of peatland moth communities to other important processes such as pollination. Watch this space!

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Whilst taxonomic work continues, it is unclear whether the swamps support unique species, or whether these relatively young (on evolutionary scales) ecosystems support just a hardy subset of wider Congolese fauna. The richness of aquatic Acentropinae (Crambidae) is of particular ongoing interest.

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Strongly contrasting seasonal patterns in moth abundance between peatland and non-peatland forest also point to altered dynamics based on water availability. Together, these results point to a suite of distinct ecological pressures shaping swamp forest moth communities.

Boxplots representing medians and distributions of abundance and species richness per trapping event for each combination of sampling treatments. Letters indicate significant differences between subsamples across wet and dry seasons for each forest strata, as determined by post hoc pairwise comparisons based on NBGLMs for each dataset.

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Nutrient limitation in the harshly acidic flooded swamp forests may contribute to strong anti-herbivore plant defences, whilst open canopies lead to very exposed understories - each of which likely suppress moth abundance beyond what is predicted based solely on hostplant distributions.

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Based on 1110 morphospecies from three one-hectare forest patches, we find evidence of species-poor but compositionally distinctive moth communities in these peatland forests. Following major taxonomic patterns in hostplant preferences, some groups flourished while others were mostly absent.

Familial proportions of moth species richness for data pooled across all sampling, data for each forest type and for each forest type split by season, plus a bar chart showing the overall recorded species richness in each subsample. For palm and hardwood swamp samples n = 8 for each season (n = 16 for combined seasonal data). For terra firme forest samples, n = 16 for dry season samples and n = 8 for wet season samples (n = 24 for combined seasonal data).

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 08/01/2026

Eoophyla dentisigna (Agassiz, 2012) Crambidae: Acentropinae C. Hackforth det. 2025 Republic of the Congo This fascinating group are aquatic as larvae, and adult females may enter the water for several hours to lay eggs. The tiny hindwing eyespots are thought to represent jumping spider mimicry.

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 07/01/2026

Zamarada protrusa serrula (Fletcher, 1974) Geometridae: Ennominae C. Hackforth det. 2023 Republic of the Congo One of ~25 Zamarada species collected from 3 hectares of Congolese lowland forest.

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

Porthesaroa sp. Erebidae: Lymantriinae C. Hackforth det. 2024 Republic of the Congo (new country record) This species currently awaits formal description.

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 05/01/2026

Maruca vitrata (Fabricius, 1787) Crambidae: Spilomelinae C. Hackforth det. 2023 Republic of the Congo (new country record)

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 30/12/2025

Heterostegane pachyspila (Fletcher D. S., 1958) Geometridae: Ennominae C. Hackforth det. 2023 Republic of the Congo (new country record)

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 23/12/2025

Cheroscelis oospila (Prout L. B., 1912) Geometridae: Geometrinae C. Hackforth det. 2023 Republic of the Congo

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

Sciatta inconcisa (Walker, 1869) Noctuidae: Pantheinae C. Hackforth det. 2023 Republic of the Congo (new country record)

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 19/12/2025

Pliniola gibba (Plötz, 1880) Erebidae: Arctiinae-Lithosiini C. Hackforth det. 2023 Republic of the Congo (new country record)

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 18/12/2025

Pseudambia albomaculalis (Hampson, 1897) Crambidae: Spilomelinae C. Hackforth det. 2025 Republic of the Congo (new country record)

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 17/12/2025

Balacra rubricincta (Holland, 1893) Erebidae: Arctiinae C. Hackforth det. 2023 Republic of the Congo

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 16/12/2025

As we come to the end of 2025 I've had some time to photograph some moth specimens from my work in the Republic of the Congo, which I will share here in the coming weeks. First up: Mazuca strigicincta (Walker, 1866) Noctuidae: Xyleninae C. Hackforth det. 2024 Republic of the Congo

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 01/12/2025

Thrilled to today be starting as a PostDoc in the TropEco lab at the University of Bristol. I'll be working on the PanTropIn project, which aims to describe drivers and impacts of insect biodiversity changes across pantropical forests. Very excited to be up and running within an exciting new team!

A view over Clifden Suspension bridge at sunset

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Charlie Hackforth @hackforth.bsky.social · 12/03/2025

Last week I defended my thesis "Structure and Function of Insect Communities in Central Congo Peatland Forests" with minor corrections. Thanks to supervisors Jan Axmacher and Simon Lewis for their inspiration and support, and to examiners Tim Newbold (UCL) and Ed Turner (Cambridge). Now, to publish!

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