Tuesday, August 10, 2010

What is this?

Last night I was out spraying some finishing spray on some projects (finally!)  I noticed this crazy butterfly/bug thing flying frantically from flower to flower.  I kind of freaked me out at first because it was flying all crazy and kept coming towards me.  I tried to take some pictures of it but it moved so fast it was hard to get good pictures.  Here's a few that turned out ok.

This one shows his sucker thing (a proboscis?) that was really long.






Kinda grosses me out looking at his big thick, furry-ish body.  I'm not a bug person, even if it does have semi-pretty wings.

My mom used to have a flowering bush by her back door at her house.  I remember seeing quite a few of these things on the bush once.  I've never seen any around my flowers here until tonight though.

Anyone know what kind of bug this is?

5 comments:

Nicolle said...

I think it's some kind of moth. I am going to ask my mom. She knows all about bugs and plants. I will get back to you! :)

Tom Peterson said...

I think, Nichole, that you got some very nice pictures of something called a laurel sphinx moth. Many people call them a "hummingbird moth" because they act so much like the hummingbird. They are in the same family as the Hummingbird Clearwing moth. They are gentle and don't mind having their picture taken. Very nice.

Anonymous said...

I was just about to say exactly what Tom said! They can get very big, but are totally harmless.

Excellent photos of your visitor!

Frizzy said...

We had them in our back yard in Vegas. I am the 3rd person to tell you I think it's a Hummingbird moth. They freaked me out the first times I encountered them. They seem to have NO FEAR of people and I felt like I was being dive bombed a time or two.

Annabelle said...

Hey, Nichole! I'm the 4th person to say it's a hummingbird moth. It was almost dark the first time I saw one...it was right next to me & scared the crap out of me. Aren't they cool?