100 More Species #55: large maple spanworm

[urbpan]

Large maple spanworm Prochoerodes lineola

We get relatively few large moths, so this was a welcome visitor. Probably in flight it would have been dismissed a brown fluttering mess, but at rest it is exquisite. The camouflage pattern breaking up the outline of the animal is variable, and the whole creature would ideally be very flat against the bark of a tree or among dead leaves. The larva is a big inchworm that has a broad taste in host plants, including several available in our yard: cherry, blueberry, grasses, and of course maple.

Comments

[bill_sheehan.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's a moth? I wouldn't have looked twice at what is obviously a dead leaf.

[plantmom.livejournal.com]

That's gorgeous! When I see things like that, it blows my mind to think they were "designed" by natural selection.