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Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Supermoth!

We had a visitor at work today - and not the two-legged kind.

My coworker came in from her break with a picture of a striking - and very big, she said - critter that looked, at first glance, like a butterfly. Since it was out in broad daylight, and sitting with its wings straight up, I assumed it was a butterfly.



Turns out, it is Hyalophora cecropia, North America's largest moth. I went out to get a better look at it, and it sports the fuzzy body and feathered antennae common to all moths. But unlike other moths (and most butterflies) I have seen, this fellow was huge. He was about 5-1/2 to 6 inches in wingspan, by my guess. And very striking for a moth, too. My only question is, why was he out in the daytime?

Maybe he was telling us to go home and get a nap.

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