Gum leaf skeletoniser
The gum leaf skeletoniser is a grey moth from Australia. Its yellow and black caterpillar has a funny nickname: the mad hatterpillar. Every time it grows, it keeps its old head skin on top, so it wears a tall stack like a hat.
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Fun facts
Each old head shell is a bit bigger than the last, so the hat stack grows taller and taller.
A mother lays 100 to 200 eggs together. Each egg is only about 1 millimetre wide.
It turned up in Auckland, New Zealand, in 2001, where it is a pest.
Scientists brought tiny wasps from Australia to New Zealand to help keep it in check.
Most asked questions about Gum leaf skeletoniser
?Why is it called the mad hatterpillar?
Because it keeps its old head skins piled on top of its head like a tall hat.
?What does the gum leaf skeletoniser eat?
Its caterpillars eat eucalyptus leaves.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Uraba lugens
- Group
- Moths
- Family
- Nolidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Nolidae
- Lives on
- Australia and Oceania
- Also known as
- Mad hatterpillar
Where the facts come from
- Uraba lugens (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 Birgit E. Rhode, Landcare Research New Zealand Ltd.. CC BY 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.
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