Pink-striped oakworm moth
Anisota virginiensis
The pink-striped oakworm moth is a silk moth with purplish red and ochre yellow wings. The scales on its wings are so thin that you can almost see through them. The male even has a big clear window in the middle of each wing.
Lives in
Southern Canada and the United States, in leafy woods and suburbs
Wingspan
4.2 to 6.6 cm (1.7 to 2.6 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It cannot bite or sting.
What does it eat?
The caterpillars eat leaves of oak, maple, birch and hazel trees.
How big is it?
How wide are its wings?
🧱wings as wide as 2 toy building bricks⚽could fly across a whole football pitch in 21 seconds
How big is Pink-striped oakworm moth compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
Pink-striped oakworm moth about 18 km/h (11 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
A car driving in town about 50 km/h (31 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
The female sends out a smell that makes males swarm around her like bees.
2
The female is bigger than the male.
3
Its grey or greenish caterpillar has pinkish stripes and two long spines near its head.
4
It spends the winter as a pupa in the soil.
you asked
Most asked questions about Pink-striped oakworm moth
?What does the pink-striped oakworm eat?
Its caterpillars eat oak, maple, birch and hazel leaves.
?How big is the pink-striped oakworm moth?
Its wings are about 4 to 7 centimetres across.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Anisota virginiensis
- Group
- Moths
- Family
- Saturniidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Saturniidae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Anisota virginiensis (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 (c) Sawyer Baran, some rights reserved (CC BY). CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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