The white-lined sphinx moth is a large-bodied moth that has to flap its wings very fast in order to stay airborne. In fact, this moth and others like it are also known as "hummingbird moths", since they tend to hover and act a lot like a hummingbird in flight (although I've never seen sphinx moths engage in aerobatic jousting matches like the hummingbirds do).
Baloo and I spotted this fellow while out on our evening walk. It was lapping up water from the grass with its proboscis, so it was occupied enough to allow me to snap a few pictures. I love the way the wings look transparent and blades of grass are visible through them.
In my research, I learned that the caterpillar stage of this beautiful moth is the dreaded tomato hornworm - the bane of gardeners! So there's the dilemma. Without the tomato hornworm, we wouldn't have these beauties, but the tomato worms are so incredibly destructive it's hard to tolerate them.
One possible solution to the puzzle suggested by an avid tomato gardener and general nature lover was to move all the tomato hornworms to a single plant and sacrifice it to their voracious appetites and keep all the other plants happy and producing tomatoes. It makes me a little itchy just to think about the poor sacrificial plant.
My brother once wrote a song about the tomato worm. And yes, I still remember it. Hmmmm.... I'm suddenly struck by an idea for a personal traveler. This requires a little more puzzling of a different sort. :)
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