MBP - Friendliest of Proboles · Naturalista Costa Rica

Hello dear friends! Facebook suggested that I write a post for International Day of Friendship today. Sounds good. I love friendship.

And so, please behold the Friendly Probole Moth (Probole amicaria), this one photographed by our good friend and MBP admin Mark Etheridge. The genus Probole is notoriously "messy" and MBP follows recent treatment "lumping" all North American Probole into this single species. You can see interesting discussion of the genus at BugGuide (https://bugguide.net/node/view/25050), such as "Covell (1984) indicated Sourwood (Oxydendrum arboreum) as a larval host plant, a species confined to the southeastern states. Considering the vast distribution of Probole amicaria, the larvae must feed on different host plants in different geographic areas." The friendly MBP community has documented this taxon around the state and from March into September. We don't currently have records for Carroll, Baltimore City, Kent, Queen Anne's, or Somerset, but some of those might await ingestion from iNat.