So some time back, a Fall Webworm moth panic laid some eggs on the wall of my apartment complex after narrowly escaping being eaten by a colony of ants. It was an absolutely terrible place for the eggs, there being literally nothing but brick and concrete nearby, and I doubt the mother would have chosen that location had it not been for the attack, so I waited for the eggs to hatch and moved the caterpillars to a bush a short distance away whenever I saw new ones crawling on the wall. It was a pretty cool opportunity to watch their life cycle, and I regularly visited the bush, watched them munch on leaves, spin webs, and grow, and recently witnessed them leaving to go build their cocoons. I even was able to catch one about halfway through the process of spinning its cocoon and watch it for a while. The other night, I saw an early bloomer that emerged from their cocoon around the same time most of the others were going into theirs, the first of the moths to emerge. It would shuffle around a bit from time to time but didn't really move much, and I expected to find it gone the following morning. It was still there, and when I still saw it there last night, I was beginning to suspect that it was dead. The moth finally flew away this morning and I was curious as to why it took so long to take off. Isn't a few hours the normal amount of time it takes for a moth's wings to dry after emerging from the cocoon? Why would a moth stay in the place they were "born" for almost 2 days before flying off?
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source https://www.reddit.com/r/Entomology/comments/ogxryw/a_newly_emerged_fall_webworm_moth_didnt_move_for/
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