Palp tooth spinner
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Palp tooth spinner ( Pterostoma palpina ) |
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| Pterostoma palpina | ||||||||||||
| ( Clerck , 1759) |
The palp tooth spinner ( Pterostoma palpina ) is a butterfly ( moth ) from the family of tooth spinners (Notodontidae).
features
The moths reach a wingspan of 35 to 52 millimeters. They have yellow-brown fore wings that have fine, dark veins. In the middle of the forewing inner edge they have a dark, tooth-like appendage with ciliates on the edge, which in the resting position stands up over the back. The hind wings are light gray-brownish. The moths have greatly enlarged jaws , which are long and bushy hairy and directed straight forward, which is why they got their name.
The caterpillars are about 40 millimeters long and have a chest section that is slightly slimmer than the rest of the body. They are light bluish green in color, but the color is clearly lighter on the back. Several fine white longitudinal lines run along the back. To the left and right of the back there is a stronger yellowish-white longitudinal line with a very fine black border at the top. On the first segment this is colored slightly pink.
Occurrence
The animals are widespread and common across Europe , east to Central Asia . They live in sparse deciduous forests and bushes, but also in parks and gardens.
Way of life
During the day, the nocturnal moths sit on tree bark with their wings set up like a roof and are difficult to recognize due to their camouflage, which imitates a piece of bark. Males and females can be attracted by artificial light, whereby the females are already active shortly after dusk and the males appear only after midnight.
Flight and caterpillar times
The moths fly in two generations from late April to early June and from late July to August. The caterpillars are found from August to September and in June and July of the following year.
Food of the caterpillars
The caterpillars feed mainly on the leaves of the trembling aspen ( Populus temula ), Sal willow ( Salix caprea ) and wicker willow ( Salix viminalis ), but also on other poplar and willow species .
development
The females lay their dull blue-green eggs individually or in small groups on the upper side of the leaves of the forage plants. The caterpillars that hatch from it eat the leaves unmistakably from the tip on both sides of the undamaged central rib on which they sit with the rear part towards the tip of the leaf. Older caterpillars, on the other hand, are usually found on branches or on the leaf stalk. They pupate on or in the ground in a loose white cocoon , with the second generation overwintering as a pupa . The doll itself is dark brown.
swell
Individual evidence
- ↑ Manfred Koch : We identify butterflies. Volume 2: Bears, Spinners, Swarmers and Drills in Germany. 2nd, expanded edition. Neumann, Radebeul / Berlin 1964, DNB 452481929 , pp. 118f.
literature
- Heiko Bellmann : The new Kosmos butterfly guide. Butterflies, caterpillars and forage plants. Franckh-Kosmos, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-440-09330-1 .
- Günter Ebert: The Butterflies of Baden-Württemberg Volume 4, Moths II (Bombycidae, Endromidae, Lemoniidae, Saturniidae, Sphingidae, Drepanidae, Notodontidae, Dilobidae, Lymantriidae, Ctenuchidae, Nolidae). Ulmer Verlag, Stuttgart 1994. ISBN 3-8001-3474-8
- Hans-Josef Weidemann, Jochen Köhler: Moths, Spinners and Swarmers . Naturbuch-Verlag, Augsburg 1996, ISBN 3-89440-128-1
Web links
- Lepiforum e. V. Taxonomy and Photos
- www.schmetterling-raupe.de
- Moths and Butterflies of Europe and North Africa (English)
- Ian Kimber: Guide to the moths of Great Britain and Ireland (English)
- Pterostoma palpina in Fauna Europaea