Subject: Unidentified eggs
Geographic location of the bug: West Kirby uk on crabapple tree leaf
Date: 04/09/2018
Time: 02:50 PM EDT
Your letter to the bugman: Hi do you know what these are?
How you want your letter signed: N medley
Dear N medley,
These are Vapourer Moth Eggs, and you can verify our identification by comparing your image to the images on Alamy and Alex Hyde Photography. According to UK Moths: “An unusual species in many ways, the males fly during the day but are often also attracted to light at night. The females are virtually wingless, an attribute normally associated with winter-emerging species, but the adults are out from July to September, sometimes October in the south. The female lays her eggs on what remains of the pupal cocoon, which then overwinter. When hatched, the very hairy caterpillars feed on a range of deciduous trees and shrubs. The species is fairly common, especially in suburban habitats, over much of Britain, but more so in the south.”
Thank you so much! We’ll leave it alone then, but I suppose we may want to move some of the caterpillars off of our little tree!
best, Nancy