Tethea or - Caterpillar dorsal

On Populus tremula

comments (3)

Christine Young

Lion

Looks like it could be Tethea sp. to me. Have you compared to Tethea ocularis? Did you spot this in the Netherlands? Posted 6 years ago
1. Pudding4brains
  
  Lion
  
  Hi Christine, thanks for having a look! Yes, I was confident of Tethea sp. too, but wasn't too sure about the species. Looked at various (trustworthy) galleries and could not find a single picture for Tethea ocularis of a mature caterpillar (this one was spinning the leafs together) with the double black sclerites on every segment, but did find a few of those for Tethea or, hence my presumption it might be that. Meantime Ingrid Altmann (golddistel.de) agreed that she would also think it to be T.or, so I'll leave it at that for now :o)
  Also added a geotag. Had left that out yesterday (sorry!) as I shot this series at my friend Jeanette's place, after she had brought it home (July 2015), so I had to inquire about the original location ... Posted 6 years ago, modified 6 years ago
2. 1. Christine Young
    
    Lion
    
    Yay that you got an accurate ID! Mine was more of an *uneducated* guess ;) Posted 6 years ago

The Poplar Lutestring

''Tethea or'', the poplar lutestring, is a moth of the family Drepanidae. It was first described by Michael Denis and Ignaz Schiffermüller in 1775. The species can be found in Europe, northern and eastern Asia and Japan. The imago resembles ''Tethea ocularis''.

The wingspan is 38–43 mm. The moths flies from April to August depending on the location.

The larvae feed on willow and poplar, mainly ''Populus tremula''.

Info 3 0

Similar species: Moths And Butterflies

Species identified by Pudding4brains