Santa Clarita and Northern Los Angeles County Area
Butterfly and Moth Site

Burns' Silk Moth [Hemileuca burnsi] Adult Insect Images

The sequence below is of a female which eclosed on 9-19-2005...

These images were taken 9-16-2005. This female was taking a break from ovipositing and held still long enough to get some decent shots. The ova can be seen in a few pictures. More shots of this event are here.

On the left is a mounted adult. Note that the wings of this species are very delicate and semi-transparent. They are also subject to yellowing if the fluid used to expand the wings "leaks" out at all. It quickly wets the wing surface, leaving an ugly yellow stain which can be only partially removed with the acetone degreasing procedure for several days. It seems to correct the undesired yellowing, but at the cost of also removing the normal lemon-yellow coloration in the forewing discs. 9-7-2005. The rest of the images are of various specimensfrom this same group which eclosed between 9-15-2005 and 9-18-2005.

These two specimens were captured near Phelan, CA on 9-28-2005 by luring them in with a scenting female. Males became active in the afternoon, and really became common around 3pm. Over 100 males came in to the one female over the course of about 3 hours. Note the lighter black markings on these specimens, compared to those reared from the Dead Mountains larvae.

This is a freshly emerged female on 9-17-2005. Note that a certain amount of yellow is naturally present (especially on the underside of the females), giving them a creamy appearance. The upper side is more of a pure white, which is particularly striking in freshly-emerged specimens with the thin jet-black band and spot pattern.

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