On Tuesday I noticed webbing at the tops of some dill plants in the garden, with moth pupae suspended within. Most webs had a single pupa, but this one had three:
Investigating further, I saw that the developing seeds on these plants were being devoured:
…and I saw this moth resting on one of the webbed umbels:
It seemed likely that this moth was the adult form of the caterpillars that were eating the seeds and pupating in the webbing, but just to be sure, I collected a few pupae. The next day, several of the same moths emerged.
To figure out what kind of moths these were, I started by searching the HOSTS database, and found that the only dill-feeding Lepidoptera listed are some swallowtails (Papilio; there was in fact a plump black swallowtail caterpillar clinging to the stem of one of the dill plants in question), two inchworms (Geometridae), an owlet moth (Noctuidae), and a tortricid. I knew these moths belonged to none of those groups; their distinctively sharp, upturned mouthparts told me they belonged to the superfamily Gelechioidea.
By chance, yesterday I happened to see a photo of an adult parsnip webworm (Elachistidae: Depressaria pastinacella), and I realized this must be something close to that. So I browsed BugGuide and quickly found the purple carrot-seed moth (D. depressana), which was recently introduced to northeastern North America from Eurasia. Based on the map at Moth Photographers Group, the records so far are mostly from southern Ontario, with a couple in adjacent southern Quebec and one near Rochester, New York. So my moths in western Massachusetts apparently represent a substantial, though unsurprising, range expansion for this species. The known host plants of this moth are all in the parsley family (Apiaceae): Daucus (carrot), Pastinaca (parsnip), Peucedanum, Pimpinella (anise), and Seseli. So dill (Anethum) evidently is a new, but similarly unsurprising, host plant.
I think it might be poor form to devote my only post during National Moth Week to an introduced pest species, so I’ll end by taking stock of the other moths I’ve met this week.
On Sunday, I saw my first Clymene moth (Erebidae: Haploa clymene) on a walk in the woods behind my house.
Otherwise, I’ve been busy writing reports all week, and the other moths I photographed all came from leaf mines I collected earlier this summer:
A 3-mm Elachista (Elachistidae, the same family as the dill moths) from quackgrass (Elymus repens)…
A 2.3-mm Stigmella (Nepticulidae) from red oak (Quercus rubra)…
Most photos I took, like the one above, only hint at the brilliant iridescence of this moth. This top view did a better job:
A very differently patterened, 1.7-mm Stigmella from chestnut oak (Quercus prinus)…
A 3-mm Phyllonorycter (Gracillariidae) from sugar maple (Acer saccharum)…
A 3.7-mm Mompha (Momphidae) from meadow evening primrose (Oenothera pilosella)…
A 2.3-mm Phyllonorycter from American chestnut (Castanea dentata)…
A 3.9-mm Cameraria (Gracillariidae) from pin oak (Quercus palustris)…
(That one, incidentally, refused to hold still, and required maybe half an hour in the freezer to prevent it from flying as soon as I dumped it out of its vial. Even so, all I was able to get were awkward action shots like the one above as it ran about in a frenzy.)
…And finally, a 4.5-mm Parornix (Gracillariidae) from gray birch (Betula populifolia).
And those, of course, are just the week’s moths. No wonder it took me all week to get those reports finished.
Love you’re blog, do you have any idea what this is ? I found it on blackberry, in central Maine on July 26, thanks
I assume you meant to include a link to a photo?
Great set of shots, Charley. Best regards, Mike.
Thanks for the info on the purple carrot seed moth. I hatched one out this year, but have had my dill heads attacked for at least 2 years now. Glad to get a name for it.
This moth has been difficult to track down. Thanks for doing the work and sharing!
I have been trying to find out for 3 years what this bug is that’s been ruining my dill flowers, which I grow for seed and for swallowtails. I am in east central Illinois. Thank you for this information!
I just found the worms on my dill in western New York. I have never found them in my garden before this. Thank you for the information
I’m glad to have found this article – discovered some new caterpillars on our dill just this week and purple carrotseed moth looks exactly like it. Thanks for sharing what you found!