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oths found in the atlantic states there you have it the dark banded geometer always a show stopper i ll end with the very last moth of the night this gigantic beauty is the polyphemus moth antheraea polyphemus due to columbus metro park rules the moth night had to officially end at midnight the night however did not end there after shutting down the mothing sheets many of the moth ers traveled down the road to a gas station that straddles the intersection of clear creek road and us route 33 why travel to a gas station you might ask well there are bright lights and these lights attract moths we might not have been able to moth in clear creek metro park at that point but we could still moth at a gas station and yes i realize how absolutely ridiculous this must sound to those of you not into moths as i mentioned earlier in this post the polyphemus was one of my spark moths and you can probably see why this thing is huge just to give you an idea of size my hand is about 8 inches long this polyphemus moth has about a 6 inch wingspan making it one of the largest moth species in ohio it s hard not to stop and take a closer look at this moth even for those who might hate insects that wraps up my two part series on some of the moths of clear creek metro park once again the first part can be found at this link mothing at clear creek the subtle thanks for reading posted by kyle brooks at 8 27 pm 1 comment email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels nature ohio photography parks arthropods fairfield county ohio insects moths location clear creek metro park 185 clear creek rd rockbridge oh 43149 united states saturday june 24 2017 mothing at clear creek the subtle last weekend i had the pleasure of attending a moth night at clear creek metro park the attendees saw a lot of moths over the course of the night and i wanted to highlight a few species in particular i ll be doing so in two posts this post will focus on some of the more drab and subtle moth species of the night while the next post will focus on the more showy and colorful moth species of the night edit click on this link to see the second post covering the showy moths of the night moth nights are fun the activity of mothing a hobby involving the pursuit of moth diversity centers primarily around moth sheets like the ones pictured above moth sheets in themselves are nothing special they re just plain white bed sheets the magic lies in the lighting although normal household lights will attract moths here and there you really need to use one of two types of special lights to really attract the moths uv lights and mercury vapor lights are the weapon of choice here with mercury vapor lights being the best of the best this moth night at clear creek consisted of 4 mothing sheets set up throughout one section of the park several dozens of various moth species visited each sheet over the night so let s jump right into some of the more drab and subtle species of the night first up is the common lytrosis lytrosis unitaria the common lytrosis is a rather large moth coming in with around a 3 inch wingspan i think this is a perfect species to start out with if it were to fly by you you might simply dismiss it as a big brown moth but upon closer inspection you would see all the minute and intricate details present in the wings we humans tend to like the showy eye grabbing things in life and we often skip over things that don t instantly grab our attention but if you start taking a closer look at those boring things you will soon find that they aren t so boring after all mothing is like looking at abstract art with abstract art the appeal lies not within some straightforward meaning that the elements of the artwork create but instead lies within the elements of the artwork themselves the colors and the contrast the changing patterns across the canvas the lines that take you on a journey through the artwork the appeal of mothing at least in my opinion is the same it s just fun to look closely at each species and see how all the colors patterns and lines interact with each other and how that changes from species to species this moth is called the barred granite speranza subcessaria and its dark patches set among a pale gray background is a great example of contrasting elements one of the most enjoyable parts of mothing lies in the process of identification this is the hemlock angle macaria fissinotata at first glance it looks almost identical to the previous barred granite but closer inspection reveals differences in patterning when i go mothing i take photos of everything i see i then spend the next week or so trying to identify each species from the comfort of my home i use the peterson field guide to moths of northeastern north america for this part identifying moths can be super frustrating but in a fun way identifying these drab moths involves a lot of flipping from page to page through the peterson guide over and over again and again eventually you find the species you re looking for but not always as the name of this species implies the larvae feed on eastern hemlock and occasionally basalm fir clear creek metro park has a big population of eastern hemlocks so it s no surprise that the hemlock angle is there when i first saw this moth i thought it was some species of emerald subfamily geometrinae but it s actually the pale metanema metanema inatomaria in the subfamily ennomina the caterpillar of the pale metanema uses various poplar species and occasionally willows as a host this is a bog lygropia lygropia rivulalis when it comes to most moths we really don t know much information about their natural history with most species we at least know what types of plants the caterpillars feed on with the bog lygropia we don t even know that in fact from what i can tell we don t even know what the caterpillar looks like there s so much fundamental information we re missing when it comes to the dark side of lepidoptera this is the beggar eubaphe mendica a rather common sight at mothing sheets the common names of moths are strange for decades there were no common names when people began getting into moths those who made guides decided that they needed common names in addition to the scientific names to solve this problem they simply began making names up some common names were based off the scientific names for example the bog lygropia is called such because its scientific name is lygropia rivulalis and it prefers wet and boggy areas other names are not as straightforward and the beggar is one such example no one is exactly sure why it s call that but the speculation is that whoever named it thought the dark patches on the wings looked like the holes in a stereotypical beggar s clothes next up is the isabella tiger moth which you probably better know as the woolly bear pyrrharctia isabella a single individual visited the mothing sheet that night and it happened to be a very worn individual that had lost a lot of its patterning luckily there isn t much else that looks like an adult isabella tiger moth if you ve ever wondered what the woolly bear turns into after metamorphosis now you know side note if you want to learn about some more fuzzy caterpillars check out my previous post caterpillars of the fuzzy variety i ll end this post with the arched hooktip drepana arcuata the adults are your typical moth the caterpillars however are unique during the arched hooktip s caterpillar stage the caterpillars like to be with other caterpillars of the same species how do they find other caterpillars they drum one caterpillar will roll a leaf up tighten it down with silk and then crawl inside this new home once inside the caterpillar will begin making vibrations by dragging parts of its anal segments against the leaf drumming with its mouthparts and performing a series of other actions the resulting vibrations are a signal to any nearby arched hooktip caterpillars to come over and hang out in the new leaf shelter and eat together this communicative behavior is super interesting and very unique among the moths at least from what we currently know if you want to read more here is a link to the original study invitation by vibration recruitment to feeding shelters in social caterpillars that s it for this post i ll have the next post covering some of the showy moths up in a few days thanks for reading edit click on this link to see the second post covering the showy moths of the night posted by kyle brooks at 4 30 pm 2 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels nature ohio photography parks arthropods fairfield county ohio insects moths location clear creek metro park 185 clear creek rd rockbridge oh 43149 united states sunday may 14 2017 some magnificent moths moths the drab and boring cousins of butterflies i think not in fact thousands and thousands of people around the world are beginning to fall in love with moths mothing a new hobby in the same vein as birding and herping is breaking into the mainstream well mainstream as nature centered hobbies go at least mothing is essentially the appreciation and seeking of moth diversity especially with the use of light traps why do people find moths interesting although i can t speak for everyone i m interested by the sheer diversity of species colors and patterns of moths just to give some perspective there are about 130 140 species of butterflies in ohio with about 725 species of butterflies that are in the us and canada now what about moths ohio alone has over 1 000 species of moths if you combine all the species of moths in the us and canada that number jumps to over 10 000 this diversity is incredible i love moth faces two weeks ago i was down in shawnee state forest for the ohio ornithological society s warblers and wildflowers weekend where i was assisting as a guide on friday and saturday night of the event when darkness fell fellow guide jeremy dominguez set up his custom built moth light trap although moths can be easily enough encountered light traps are an incredibly effective way to draw in scores of moths jeremy uses a strong mercury vapor light the most effective at drawing in moths to attract any nearby moths he strings up a white sheet next to the light to allow the moths a place to rest which also gives the moth ers a place to easily view the moths the moths in this post are a few of the more eye catching species that came to this trap i ll start with the azalea sphinx darapsa choerilus the sphinx moths are all attention grabbers due to either their size colors or both the azalea sphinx is a medium sized sphinx moth which is on the larger size compared to most moths with a rich chestnut color and pinkish hues many times the common name of a moth will reflect its preferred host plant which is the type of plant the caterpillar will feed on and the azalea moth is a great example the caterpillars of this species will feed on various azalea species genus rhododendron but will also feed on black gum and various viburnum species this inch long black and white beauty is the hebrew polygrammate hebraeicum the name stems from the black markings on its wings which resemble the characters of the hebrew alphabet the host plant of the hebrew is the black gum a species of tree when it comes to host plant specificity moths can be broken into 2 general groups there are moths who have two or more host plant species and then there are moths who only utilize a single specific plant species as their host plant with the hebrew falling into the latter group this moth can only be found wherever there are populations of black gum next up is the oak beauty phaeoura quernaria due to the sheer diversity of moths in ohio identification can be difficult unique looking moths like the previous two can be relatively easy to identify when you come across a more stereotypical moth with a camouflaged appearance identification becomes more difficult you begin relying on the shapes of lines on the wing presence or absence of any dots or otherwise characteristic features colors wing shape etc and then you get moths like the oak beauty which are variable with variable moths the exact colors lines patterning etc can vary from individual to individual making identification even harder the oak beauty can be id ed by its overall charcoal color and the presence of 2 wavy black lines across the wings with a varying amount of white associated with these black lines when you re dealing with such a diverse group of animals you re going to run into a variety of body forms a group of moths with a rather unique body form are the leaf blotch miner moths what a name these micro moths often prop themselves up using their forelegs such as the individual pictured above this specific species is the maple caloptilia caloptilia bimaculatella which can be identified by the presence of two creamy white triangles on either side of its wings another group of moths with a unique body form are the plume moths a moth can instantly be identified as a type of plume moth family pterophoridae by its t shaped body at rest a plume moth will roll up its modified wings giving it this t shape appearance plume moths are very difficult to identify down to species with most cases requiring careful dissection suffice to say i have no idea what species that the pictured plume moth is a group of moths i am always delighted to see are the emeralds the emeralds are all mostly pale green moths with lines of various other colors this individual is a white fringed emerald nemoria mimosaria the emeralds belong to the incredibly diverse and speciose family of moths called the geometers geometridae you might better know the geometers as the inch worms in fact this is why the family is named geometridae geometridae is based off of the latin word geometra which translates to earth measurer as the caterpillars of the geometridae moths inch along they could be said to be measuring the earth my favorite moth of all time is this magnificent beauty the rosy maple moth dryocampa rubicunda moths don t get much better than this in my opinion luckily the rosy maple moth is pretty common in ohio the rosy maple belongs to the saturniidae family of moths also known as the giant silkworm and royal moths this family holds most of the large stunning moths people are familiar with such as the luna moth cecropia moth and imperial moth but not all the saturniids are large the rosy maple moth is only about two inches long and an inch wide small by saturniid standards like other saturniid moths the adult rosy maple moth has no mouthparts it does all of its feeding during its caterpillar phase the sole purpose of an adult upon emergence from the pupal stage is to find a mate reproduce and then wait for death i ll end this post with the star of the weekend well at least when it comes to moths as you might recognize this is a luna moth actias luna the luna moth a large moth in th...
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