Life is a pheromone
May 17th, 2009 by Bartshé, Education Director
closeAuthor: Bartshé, Education Director
Name: Bartshé Miller
Title: Education Director
About: Bartshé directs the Committee's Outdoor Experiences Program, Canoe Program, and Interpretive Programs, and manages the Mono Basin Field Station. He has been an Eastern Sierra resident since 1993.See All Posts by Bartshé (30)
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If you’re an adult male Columbia silk moth, it’s all about pheromones. Male Hyalaphora columbia gloveri spend their precious few evenings of adult life zigzagging upwind in search of a female’s pheromone signal. If they are lucky enough to be the first male to find a female, they have fulfilled their purpose. Most adults (male and female) don’t live longer than six days and live only off the fat they accumulated as larvae. This individual was found along Hwy 395 near the Lundy Road on May 17. Hyalaphora is the most striking moth in the Mono Basin, and is as fleeting as it is beautiful.

Hyalaphora columbia gloveri. Photo by Bartshe Miller.
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on Sunday, May 17th, 2009 at 12:18 pm and is filed under News, Staff Musings.
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