Forest Pests: Insects, Diseases & Other Damage Agents

Festive Pine Looper (Nepytia species [undescribed])

Maier, C.T., C.R. Lemmon, J.M. Fengler, D.F. Schweitzer, and R.C. Reardon. 2004. Caterpillars on the Foliage of Conifers in the Northeastern United States. FHTET-2004-1. Morgantown, WV: USDA Forest Service, Forest Health Technology Enterprise Team; 151 p.

Description. Boldly multicolored body with spotted head and prothoracic shield and with distinct longitudinal lines and stripes. Yellowish orange head and prothoracic shield with large black spots; greenish orange thoracic legs with black toward tip. Orange to greenish orange dorsum on T2 to A9, with darker, faint, middorsal stripe; white and yellow subdorsal stripe with black longitudinal line at margins; lavender area below with two more black lines (lower one essentially supraspiracular stripe); broad, yellow spiracular stripe with black longitudinal line below; black spiracles ringed with white. Yellowish orange prolegs and anal plate with small black spots. Up to 25 mm.

Food. Pitch pine; less commonly eastern white and other pines.

Life Cycle. One generation. Egg overwinters. Mature caterpillar present in July and August in southern New England, and in June and July in southern New Jersey.

Comments. The pupa, which is formed in a flimsy cocoon among needles, is striped with dull orange to light brown and white. The festive pine looper is an undescribed species of Nepytia that occurs in coastal areas in southern New England and in the mid-Atlantic states to at least central Virginia. The similar false pine looper, N. pellucidaria, is found mainly in northern New England.

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