Yellow-shouldered slug moth
The yellow-shouldered slug moth is a small, fluffy brown moth with a white stripe across its wings. Its caterpillar is the real surprise. It is flat, green and striped, and it creeps along like a tiny slug.
How fast is it?
Fun facts
The caterpillar has very short legs. Its back legs work like little suction cups, so it glides instead of walking.
A full-grown caterpillar is only about 15 millimetres long and has tiny dents all over its back.
Before it turns into a moth, it makes a cocoon shaped like a cup, with a round door to climb out of.
The grown-up moth is only about 1 centimetre long and looks a bit hairy.
Most asked questions about Yellow-shouldered slug moth
?What does the yellow-shouldered slug caterpillar eat?
Leaves of many trees and shrubs, for example apple, oak, beech, maple and willow.
?Why is it called a slug moth?
Because its caterpillar is flat and smooth and slides along like a little slug.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Lithacodes fasciola
- Group
- Moths
- Family
- Limacodidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Limacodidae
- Lives on
- North America
- Also known as
- Yellow-shouldered slug, Ochre-winged hag moth
Where the facts come from
- Lithacodes fasciola (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 Lior Carlson. CC BY-SA 4.0, 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.
Bug Wiki honey jar For grown-ups: Bug Wiki is free, with no ads and no tracking. A small tip helps keep it online.Leave a tip
Atlas moth
Luna moth
Hummingbird hawk-moth
Domestic silk moth
Isabella tiger moth
Polyphemus moth
Pennsylvania wood cockroach
European spruce bark beetle
Blue ghost firefly
Giant Asian mantis
Broad-necked root borer
Great capricorn beetle.jpg){kind=link}