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Diamondback moths are migratory pests found in the Americas, Europe, New Zealand and Southeast Asia, but especially in areas where crops can be grown yearround. In these parts -- where it's not too hot nor too cold -- are where diamondback moths cause the greatest problems, including billions of dollars in damages to cruciferous crops such as cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower and canola. They're one of the most damaging insects because of their high reproduction rate and resistance to most insecticides. To address these problems in a sustainable, environmentally friendly way, researchers have successfully genetically engineered (GE) male diamondback moths to...

A horde of moths has invaded a small French town, leaving its residents fed up and unable to walk out at night. The town of Oyonnax, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in eastern France, has been host to thousands and thousands of boxwood moths for the past few weeks, according to locals. Footage, filmed by Gaelle Lecompte earlier this month, shows a ‘cloud’ of the little critters sticking to windows and flying around the streetlights. Box moths, and especially the caterpillars before they become moths, can be particularly destructive to gardens and hedges. Native to East Asia, the insects have only...

A miniscule moth with a wingspan of just 0.4 inches is the first species to be named for the soon-to-be president of the United States, Donald Trump. Yellow and white scales topping the moth's head resemble Trump's signature hairstyle, inspiring the name Neopalpa donaldtrumpi, wrote evolutionary biologist Vazrick Nazari, a researcher from Ottowa, Canada, in a new study. The moth's habitat extends from Southern California in the U.S. through Baja California in Mexico. The wall that the president-elect has proposed building along the border between the two countries could divide that stretch. Nazari discovered the new species while examining moth...

Both butterflies and moths have four stages of life – they go from the initial egg to a caterpillar, then to a cocoon and finally to a butterfly or moth. We often think that whatever comes out of the cocoon is always more beautiful than the caterpillar that made it, but in some cases, this is not the case. In these 19 pictures, you’ll see the transformation, and decide for yourself if you prefer the caterpillar or the butterfly/moth… Click on any of the images to see the transformation!

Good morning and happy June to my gardening FRiends and fellow gardeners!You may have noticed that I titled last week's thread "Keywords", and then totally forgot to write the first word about the topic. That illustrates perfectly how frazzled my mind is these days. As I was getting ready to hit the post button, I kept thinking there was something I was forgetting, but finally convinced myself that it probably wasn't *that* important, and I posted the thread. I apologize.There has been more than once that great information has been posted by one of our members, but I can't...

I found a little white moth in my front yard, and he seemed to like my finger - I took this photo

Of Moths and Men Moth-like Agencies Pose as Economic Butterflies Wayne Lusvardi - The Pasadena Pundit Let's see if you can make sense of the following confusing picture using examples drawn from Southern California but certainly replicated across the country. A New Obsolescent Reservoir? Earlier this month California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein proposed a $9.3 billion bond to build yet another new reservoir in Northern California to inconsistently "offset the climate change impacts of reduced snow pack and higher flood flows" and to finally route water around the Sacramento Delta to Southern California. But in 2004,...

The vision of airplanes rumbling slowly over San Francisco, spraying a pesticide mist on parks and playgrounds, has now mobilized one of the most effective lobbying groups in the world. Moms. The California Department of Food and Agriculture's plan to eradicate the light brown apple moth with aerial spraying over the city this summer was already in an uphill fight. But when 100 or so mothers and kids showed up at City Hall on Monday afternoon with signs like "Keep Your Spray Off My Baby," it was clear that the battle had entered a new phase. "Nothing gets people more...

Think twice before biting into a chocolate to loose yourself in its taste - you might actually be chewing a wee bit more then you bargained for. On Wednesday (August 29).. worms and moths crawled out of a box of chocolates imitating a popular international brand, and even a few larvae. But by the time this was noticed, a few chocolate balls had been consumed. The chocolates were picked up by a Korean consumer on his trip to China. But local manufactoring experts say it looks as though the contamination happened during the manufactoring process. "It seems to be seriously...

......................''It's a very huge outbreak," Joseph Elkinton, an entomologist at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, said yesterday. ''The main thing going on is winter moths. Most of the defoliation you see on the South Shore and on Cape Cod is winter moths, and that caterpillar has finished its feeding." ......The infestation is not as severe in the Boston area as it is to the south, and it is not quite as bad as in the 1980s, when gypsy moth caterpillars were more widespread and were found everywhere from sidewalks to screen doors. Robert Childs, also an entomologist at UMass-Amherst,...

Jonathan Wells, Ph.D.Department of Molecular Cell BiologyUniversity of CaliforniaBerkeley, California, USA Every student of biological evolution learns about peppered moths. The dramatic increase in dark forms of this species during the industrial revolution, and experiments pointing to differential bird predation as the cause, have become the classical story of evolution by natural selection. The same careful scientific approach which established the classical story in the first place, however, has now revealed major flaws in it. It is time to take another look.The peppered moth, Biston betularia, comes in various shades of gray. One hundred and fifty years ago, the...

SYDNEY (Reuters) - No one really knows if the millions of giant moths that swoop down on Australian cities each spring are suicidal or just sloppy aviators. Either way it's swatting season again Down Under. Reuters Photo Unlike the kangaroos and crocodiles that inhabit Australia's vast outback and swamps, the moths, called bogongs, prefer the big city lights of Sydney and Melbourne, where they flutter into high-rise offices, drown in bowls of soup, pester bus drivers, even freeze to death in refrigerators, come late October. "They travel at night and are attracted to urban lights and the type used for...

Jonathan Wells, Ph.D. Department of Molecular Cell Biology University of California Berkeley, California, USAEvery student of biological evolution learns about peppered moths. The dramatic increase in dark forms of this species during the industrial revolution, and experiments pointing to differential bird predation as the cause, have become the classical story of evolution by natural selection. The same careful scientific approach which established the classical story in the first place, however, has now revealed major flaws in it. It is time to take another look.The peppered moth, Biston betularia, comes in various shades of gray. One hundred and fifty years ago,...