Another installment of Genius of the Press, and perhaps a bit of a softball. (Yikes these are easy to find) Who can tell me whats wrong with this article?
Genius of the Press, v. IVAnother installment of Genius of the Press, and perhaps a bit of a softball. (Yikes these are easy to find) Who can tell me whats wrong with this article?
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Skepticism |
Well, I’m no moth expert, but that picture is not Copitarsia or any other noctuid.
Moreover, “the Noctuid Moth”? As if Copitarsia is the only representative of this humongous family – what are there, several tens of thousands of species?
The picture figures a Brahmaeidae!!!!
Exactly! Maurizio hit the nail on the head with the correct family ID for the moth, it is most likely Brahmaea hearseyi (Brahmaeidae), which is closely related to a silk moth. Not only is the family way off, but these moths are from Malaysia.
Ted pointed out another important fact. A “Noctuid” moth is a type of moth, not one species (one of tens of thousands). The way they worded the article was painful… “the Noctuid moth”!
Another example of ridiculously bad science journalism.
Australia’s population of fire ants are always appearing in the press, and I’ve lost count of the number of times I have seen other families of ant depicted. Can’t be that hard to find a genuine Solenopsis pic…
Apart from that…I just wanted to say what a stunning moth that is. Not seen one before.
(Oh… and nice blog!)