Chocolate Prominent

 Peridea ferruginea  

June 18, 2007

Two prominents (notodontids) in a row this month - both in the genus Peridea.  

This one's mainly a birch-feeder (the caterpillars, of course), and while in 1864 Packard looked at this moth and thought "rusty" (ferruginea), Covell looked at it for his book "Eastern Moths" 120 years later and thought "chocolate" - hence the common name.