Shrouded

OK, so i went to Oxford and that included, of course, looking at some trees. And I have never seen this before! Willows literally shrouded! I'd seen some long strands and thought they were anomalous and then I saw this tree who was as if bandaged in silk. I guess that the bugs are the ones whose parents made the webs?

Now, I had seen that ermine moths can cover bushes, but I had only seen it in the way depicted on this page. It seems the willow ermine moth, though, was the likely culprit - with one of the larval stages looking as I saw on these trees.

It reminded me of a story I covered years ago for Anglia News. It was an art thing and a woman had bandaged trees in a park to demonstrate their vulnerability and the need to care for them. Well, the moths do that in fine fashion... although in theory they go on to eat all the leaves.

What's odd about this is the time of year: these moths have only one brood which tends to be in spring or early summer. The sedum small ermine has two broods, but they feed on sedum. What's that, I hear you ask. Good question... they are flowering plants known as stonecrops. I know, that's not terribly helpful, but what they are is very very different from willows.

The only thing I can think of is that maybe these are just the husks, the discarded skins... and the caterpillars have turned to moths who have flown and died by now?