Bush Buds: Golden Sun Moth
Event description
About me:
The Golden Sun Moth is a medium-sized moth with green eyes and clubbed antennae, which is unusual because most other moths have brushy antennae. Females have their hindwings marked in a pattern of golden-orange and black, while males are more cryptically marked overall, like the females’ forewings.
After mating, females lay up to 200 eggs at the bottom of wallaby grass tussocks. After
21 days, the larvae hatch then tunnel underground where they remain for up to two years feeding on wallaby and spear grass roots - recently they’ve added exotic Chilean Needlegrass to their diet. They then dig a vertical tunnel to the surface where the pupa remain for six weeks until the adult moths emerge. When females emerge from the tunnel as adults, they already possess fully developed eggs and begin to search for a mate, flashing their hindwings to attract any males that fly overhead during the day. Get this: adults only live for two to five days as they have no functional mouthparts so cannot feed.
Threats:
Less than one per cent of their pre-European grassland habitat remains; as a result, the remaining Golden Sun Moth populations are highly reduced and fragmented, exposed to the adverse genetic effects of isolation.
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