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Sticker of Svensson's copper underwing
Bug card No. 4246 of 4,939

Svensson's copper underwing

Amphipyra berbera
Eats: PlantsMothsForests and woods6 legs

Svensson's copper underwing is a brown moth that hides a shiny copper colour on its back wings. When it opens its wings, the copper glows. It flies at night and loves anything sugary.

Lives in
Europe and Russia east to the Ural Mountains
Wingspan
4.7 to 5.6 cm (1.9 to 2.2 in)
Top speed
about 17 km/h (11 mph)
Flying, estimate
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It cannot bite or sting.
What does it eat?
Its caterpillars eat the leaves of many trees and bushes, such as oak, willow, maple, lime and lilac.
For real!Photo of Svensson's copper underwing
Picture by Ilia Ustyantsev from Russia. CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How wide are its wings?

Svensson's copper underwing wings about 5.6 cm tip to tip (2.2 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)A banana about 18 cm (7.1 in)
wings as wide as 2 toy building brickscould fly across a whole football pitch in 22 seconds

How big is Svensson's copper underwing compared to YOU?

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How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

It looks almost exactly like the copper underwing. You can tell them apart only by the underside of the back wings.

2

The girls are usually bigger than the boys.

3

It spends the winter as an egg.

4

It flies from July to September and is strongly drawn to sugar.

you asked

Most asked questions about Svensson's copper underwing

?What does Svensson's copper underwing eat?

Its caterpillars eat leaves of trees and bushes like oak, willow, maple and lilac.

?How is it different from the copper underwing?

Under its back wings, it is evenly coloured. The copper underwing has a pale middle with dark edges there.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Amphipyra berbera
Named by
Rungs, 1949
Group
Moths
Family
Noctuidae
Classification
Insecta > Lepidoptera > Noctuidae
Lives on
Europe

Where the facts come from

  1. Svensson's copper underwing (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by Ilia Ustyantsev from Russia. CC BY-SA 2.0, 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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More from the same group: Moths

Also at home here: Forests and woods

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