A big beautiful Luna Moth

[Joe_T]

Luna Moth (Actias luna)

My wife found this big beautiful moth on our porch yesterday morning. It is unusual to see one during daylight. It was alive and fluttering its wings but didn't fly away. I took several shots of it and then nudged it onto a paper towel and placed it on a seat cushion so I wouldn't have to be on my hands and knees or bend over too much. It still didn't fly away and I wondered why so I looked up information on it and apparently it only lives 7 to 10 days. After reading that I assumed its rather short live was coming to an end. I left it on the seat cushion and when I came back about an hour later it was gone! I'm not sure if it flew away or if some bird or other predator grabbed it.

This is a very large moth with a wing span of about 4 inches. Another interesting fact about the Luna Moth is that it has no mouth parts and does not eat anything as a moth. It relies on everything it ate as a caterpillar! Insects are amazing.

For some reason I'm not able to upload photos as I always have. The upload selection is not being shown and I haven't changed anything. I hope you can see these.

[Ian]

Hi Joe, the clip board button, to the left of the A toggles the upload attachments button - can you try that?

Ian

[Joe_T]

Yes, thanks Ian. I can see it but I can't figure out how it got toggled off. Do I need to do anything else with that post as it is showing up now but the pictures are not as large as when I use the upload button.

[David Mallott]

What an amazing creature! The details on the wings look like they've been painted on in watercolour.

[Joe_T]

Thanks. I was planning to get some shots of the underside as it has quite a coat of fur. Unfortunately it was gone by the time I got back to it.