Lawn armyworm moth
The lawn armyworm moth is a plain grey brown moth. Its caterpillars are famous because they march through fields in huge groups, like a little army. They can eat a whole rice field in just a few days.
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Fun facts
Farmers sometimes bring bolas spiders to their fields. These spiders give off a smell like a female moth and catch the male moths that come looking.
It lives on many Pacific islands, including Hawaii, Fiji and Samoa.
Bats eat these moths. Scientists found them in the droppings of a bat.
In the past, swarms of its caterpillars destroyed huge rice fields in Malaysia, Sri Lanka and India.
Most asked questions about Lawn armyworm moth
?Why is it called an armyworm?
Because its caterpillars move through fields in huge groups, like an army.
?What do lawn armyworms eat?
Grasses, especially rice, wheat and lawn grass.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Spodoptera mauritia
- Named by
- Boisduval, 1833
- Group
- Moths
- Family
- Noctuidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Noctuidae
- Lives on
- Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania
- Also known as
- Lawn armyworm, Paddy swarming caterpillar
Where the facts come from
- Spodoptera mauritia (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Richard Fuller. CC0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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