My daughter and I were walking into her school for our schools summer Accerated Readng program. My daughter saw it first and it was so large it kind of freaked us out. I took pictures of it with my cellphone and was able to identify it with this picture. I have lived in Illinois for all my life (46 yrs) and I have never seen anything like this moth. I even brought the other kids and parents that were attending AR out to see the butterfly (as I thought it was originally).
Cecropia moth by: Moni
Anonymous
If you want to raise the eggs, then here is a website about how to do that and if you have questions they are great about helping!
Good luck
http://www.aprairiehaven.com/?p=711
Whoa by: Anonymous
i was out for a walk in the pasture and i found the same moth. Part of it's left wing was damaged and couldn't fly. I noticed that i had already started to lay eggs on the branch it was laying on. Not wanting a cat to eat it, i put it in a large aquarium i have and it has been laying eggs for the last few days. Im excited to see if the eggs will hatch.
Cecropia Moth by: Moni
Camryn
These moths can fly, but they do fly at night so....many times you see them sitting during the daytime.
If the wing is not too damaged it can fly. They do not live long....basically to mate and lay eggs.
Hopefully it was not damaged by a bird and has done it's job for this lifetime. :-)
What a find!! :) by: Camryn
I was just on a walk and our neighbors stopped us and said look at this!! And I said, "What is it" And I look down and see this exact moth. It looked like a robin had took a bite out of his wing though when we saw him. It was just on a tree, not moving. We knew that it was still alive, but we thought that it must have been injured. What I was wondering was if it could fly or not. I just thought that maybe it was a creature so big and unique that it just crawled anywhere it needed to go.
Brown & Orange Moth by: Anonymous
We found one of these on the ground we rescued it and will let it looses in our backyard. Lothian, MD
Cecropia Moth by: Moni
Darlene
You and your granddaughter are very fortunate to have seen one of these gorgeous moths! From your photo it looks like it may have just emerged from its pupal cocoon. Also, I am not positive due to the angle but it looks like it is a male because of the very feathery antenna. These are beautiful moths! One of the largest in the US. You have found a Cecropia moth...one of the large silk moths, family Saturniidae.
Living in a rural area you have a better chance of see one that in a big city, however, the adults are known to come to lights at night especially the large shopping centers or gas station lights. The adults are out now looking for the right tree to lay eggs.
Larvae feed on leaves of various trees and shrubs including alder, apple, ash, beech, birch, box-elder, cherry, dogwood, elm, gooseberry, maple, plum, poplar, white oak, willow.
Adults do not feed.
These are found east of the Rocky Mountains, from Nova Scotia south to Florida.
What a great find!
