Forest Pests: Insects, Diseases & Other Damage Agents

Pine Looper (Hypagyrtis species)

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. Reddish brown body with grayish white dorsal triangles and lateral spots. Grayish white head mottled with reddish brown; lightened areas on front of head appear as four spots or as two horizontal streaks through frons. Middorsal stripe forms mainly diamond-shaped patches with their dark brown margins connected to dark subdorsal spot on each segment. Low, transverse dorsal hump on A8 marked with small white spot at each end. Dark brown spots on spiracular swellings; large grayish white spot between raised spiracular areas; narrow, wavy, greenish white subspiracular stripe. Up to 30 mm.

Food. Balsam fir, eastern hemlock, and pines; less commonly eastern larch and other conifers.

Life Cycle. One generation in New England. Partly grown caterpillar overwinters usually on exposed wood or foliage of tree. Mature caterpillar present from May to July.

Comments. The form of Hypagyrtis that we collected is now the dominant one on conifers from southern Connecticut to at least southern New Hampshire. Based on adults in museum collections, this variety was uncommon in New England during the first half or more of the twentieth century. The moth is darker and more brownish than that of the typical diamond-backed looper, H. piniata, which during the 1990s was scarce in our sampling areas in New England. We suspect that the caterpillar pictured here is either a variant of the esther moth, H. esther, that has expanded its range northward, or a formerly rare, dark form of H. piniata that has now become dominant. Another plausible explanation is that H. esther and H. piniata may now freely hybridize. In New Jersey, the esther moth has two generations with mature caterpillars in May and early June and again in late July and August.

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