NMW: Red-fringed Emerald

It's National Moth Week, and while Urban Dragon Hunters is primarily about dragonflies, we are keen on many other insect taxa as well. Why not try to feature a cool moth every day this week?

We'll finish off the week with one of the beautiful emeralds. This is a Red-fringed or Two-striped Emerald (Nemoria bistriaria, Hodges #7046). Who doesn't love a green moth? Never mind that this species has a brown spring form. BugGuide even has an interesting intermediate form; the scale colors are apparently influenced by pre-emergence temperatures.

Photo by Darrin O'Brien. All rights reserved.

NMW: Buck moth

It's National Moth Week, and while Urban Dragon Hunters is primarily about dragonflies, we are keen on many other insect taxa as well. Why not try to feature a cool moth every day this week?

Day 6 is yet another diurnal moth, a buck moth (Hemileuca sp., likely H. nevadensis, Hodges#7731, as there were larvae feeding on willows). Buck moths are in the silkworm moth family (Saturniidae), and while not quite a spectacular as many of their relatives, are still quite showy. The caterpillars have urticating spines -- they sting, although the punch varies by species.

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has a nice post about the possible origin of the name "buck moth" and the taxonomy morass that occurs in here in the upper Midwest.

Photo by Darrin O'Brien. All rights reserved.

NMW: Carrot Seed Moth

It's National Moth Week, and while Urban Dragon Hunters is primarily about dragonflies, we are keen on many other insect taxa as well. Why not try to feature a cool moth every day this week?

Day 5's moth is one that is not native to North America. The Carrot Seed Moth, a.k.a., Greenish-Yellow Sitochroa Moth (Sitochroa palealis, Hodges #4986.1) is a European/Palearctic moth first recorded on this side of the pond in the Upper Midwest in 2002. The larvae feed on umbellifers, especially the well-established non-native Queen Anne's Lace or wild carrot, Daucus carota. The caterpillars are more conspicuous than the ordinary-looking adults, as they weave themselves into the seed heads of the plants; they can be found by searching for these frass baskets.

Photo by Julie Craves, all rights reserved.

NMW: Chestnut-marked Pondweed Moth

It's National Moth Week, and while Urban Dragon Hunters is primarily about dragonflies, we are keen on many other insect taxa as well. Why not try to feature a cool moth every day this week?

Day 4's little beauty is a Chestnut-marked Pondweed Moth (Parapoynx badiusalis, Hodges #4761). In addition to being pretty, the larvae of this moth have an unusual lifestyle -- they are aquatic. They feed on pondweed (Potamogeton). You can read more about them (and see this photo again!) in a blog post I recently wrote for Audubon Guides, "The Moth that Came from the River."

Photo by Julie Craves. All rights reserved.

NMW: Carpenterworm moth

It's National Moth Week, and while Urban Dragon Hunters is primarily about dragonflies, we are keen on many other insect taxa as well. Why not try to feature a cool moth every day this week?

For Day 3, we don't have a photo of an adult moth, but only the shell of a couple of pupae. Note the ruler in the photo -- those are centimeters. These empty pupae were extracted from holes in the base of a hardwood tree that were at least the diameter of my thumb.  They belong to Prionoxystus robiniae, the Carpenterworm Moth (Hodges #2693).

The larvae of these moths take two to four years to mature into caterpillars up to three inches long.  As you may have gathered, they feed on the sapwood of trees. I was fascinated by them, and wrote a post on another blog at the time I found them. For the curious, here is what the adults look like.

Photo by Julie Craves. All rights reserved.