Brunia antica laying eggs

Description:

Female ‘Brunia antica’ was on the garden wall, near the light source and was about 13 mm long. Its wing’s bottom edges were torn and it was laying eggs. The eggs were very tiny and round. The eggs formed a very beautiful pattern on the wall. After 5 days, tiny caterpillars(larvae) hatched from the eggs.

Notes:

‘Brunia antica’ is a moth of the Arctiidae family. There is strong sexual dimorphism in the imago, with the males having a more or less uniform straw colour, whereas females have the forewing darker, greyer, with a narrow straw-coloured costal strip. This species has a wingspan of 26 mm. The biology is unknown, but the larvae probably feeds on lichen and algae. The larva is densely covered with blackish and grey-brown hairs, with long black hairs protruding from this. There is also a transverse black band towards the anterior. The body appears somewhat flattened. Pupation is in a dense cocoon, with a period of about ten days for completion.