Day-fliers and porch-lighters

Dale Roberts/Bill Yule droberts03 at SNET.Net
Wed May 29 12:16:39 EDT 2002


Hi all,
   I gotta admit it, I love field reports.  It's great to hear what folks are seeing and to get a "heads up" on what's flying and where.  Most of us are probably butterfly oriented but gradually we expand into the realm of NCL.  What's NCL? Non-Charismatic Lepidoptera!   AKA moths.
   For me, (if you exclude the Space-shuttle-like Giant Silkworm moths), it's gone like this:  First I became interested in the day fliers (Humming-bird Clearwing & Eight-spotted Forester were the first two) and then I went for the porchlighters (they come to you!). Dayfliers got me because I thought they were butterflies.  Porchlighters got me because increasingly I stopped short of going in the house with my hand frozen on the doorknob because a moth at the light captured my attention.
    This week I've been seeing a moth that's both a dayflier and a porchlighter.  Heliomata cycladata, The Common Spring Moth or Stout Locust Looper (whichever common name you like) is all around my yard by day and at the light at night. This cool moth has a tuxedo like appearance, black and white pattern, two big white spots(connected through both fore and hind wings) and two little white spots (at the apex of the forewings) edged in black and is easy for us moth novices to pick out.  If you have locust trees in your neighborhood look for this moth, pictured in both the "Peterson Field Guide to Moths" and Wagners "Geometoid Caterpillars of NE and Appalachian Forests." 

                              Bill Yule
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