By Christy Solo – ONPA 1st Place Award Winner for Best Local Column
This week’s crawly has a fun (and maybe familiar) name. Meet the salt-and-pepper looper moth (Syngrapha rectangular).
Of course we’re all familiar with salt and pepper, but did “looper” ring a bell? In our rich agricultural area that part of our crawly’s name may give some folks cause for concern.
However, you guessed it! Don’t panic!
There are approximately 76 species of looper moths (Subfamily Plusiinae) in North America and a very few of those fall into the “pest” category. Our salty crawly is not one of those.
Here in our area Salty (as we’ll call our featured looper for short) has two cousins you may not want to see in your yard: The cabbage looper (Trichoplusia ni) and the alfalfa looper (Autographa californica).
If you have a backyard garden and grow cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, cabbage, kale, collard greens or kohlrabi, the cabbage looper might prove pesty.
Alfalfa loopers go in for legumes such as alfalfa and clover so they might bother you if you’ve just put in a summer green bean crop.
Salty, though, we can appreciate for their speckled good looks and wickedly efficient “Nothing to see here, just some lichen” camo skills.
Before we delve into salty’s diet, let’s back up a bit to the “looper” moniker. Where does that come from? Do these moths fly in loop de loops? That would be fun to see, but sadly, no.
Their loopy name comes from the manner in which they get about as caterpillars. Much like the inchworms of the Geometrid moth subfamily, looper moths hunch up – or loop – in the middle as they get along. Quite a whimsical common name, and what is life without a little whimsy?
Loopers definitely fared better in the common name department than, say, spanworm and cutworm moths.
Back to salty’s diet. Here in the PNW their pillars dine on Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) and western hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla). Northeastern populations prefer balsam fir (Abies balsamae).
As evidenced by our many enormous Douglas firs, saltys aren’t pillars of mass defoliation. They prefer a solitary life away from their siblings and don’t cause noticeable damage to our state tree.
Speaking of noticeable, it isn’t just adult saltys who excel at camouflage. The caterpillars are pale green with vertical white stripes allowing them to blend in seamlessly with spring conifer foliage.
Adult saltys are just over one-half inch in length and though we have several area loopers who look similar at-a-glance, saltys rock unique coloring which makes them – if not easy to ID, at least ID-able.
The wash of green blending into the white at the base of their wings (the part nearest their heads) not only likens them to lichen but is the tell that you’ve spotted a salty. We don’t know if it makes the other similar loopers green with envy.
Adult saltys will be on the wing – and maybe under your porchlights – June – August so keep your eyes peeled for their extra special wash of green!
