Sphinx chersis
species of insect
Sphinx chersis, the great ash sphinx or northern ash sphinx, is a moth that belongs to the family Sphingidae.
Appearance
This insect has a large wing span (90 to 130 mm). The upperside of the forewing is soft dark gray to blue gray with a series of black dashes, one of which reaches the wing tip. The upperside of the hindwing is black with blurry pale gray bands. The larva of this species is typically light green with blue dashes and a bluish-green horn, but there is also a red morph. Its appearance is very similar to that of others in the subfamily Sphinginae.
Biology
Its larvae feed upon various plants in the olive family (Oleaceae) such as lilacs (Syringa spp.), ashes (Fraxinus spp.), and privet (Ligustrum vulgare). Mature caterpillars pupate in subterranean chambers when they have finished feeding, and here the pupae stay dormant until the next year. The moth emerges any time from May to August in the South, but is only found from June to July further north. Adults feed at dusk on deep-throated flowers and have been sighted at honeysuckles (Lonicera spp.), evening primroses (in the family Onagraceae), dogbane (Apocynum spp.), phlox (Phlox spp.), and bouncing bet (Saponaria officinalis).
The public source identifies “Sphinx chersis” as species of insect. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Sphinx, chersis and species.
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Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Nov 10, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q140657. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Sphinx chersis” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.