It's a Cutworm

Earlier this week, I blogged about a mass of white eggs that I found on a grape shoot. I cut the shoot and brought it home to take better photos.

The eggs were laid in such perfect rows that it was quite beautiful. When we ran into Pamm Cooper at the Soil and Cover Crops Workshop held at Woodstock Orchards she quickly identified the eggs as cutworm eggs.

It was good to know what they were and her diagnosis was confirmed the following day when I happened to check the container that I put the grape shoot in. The eggs had begun to hatch. There were many of these little black worms in the container, so taking one out, we took a photo next to a ball point pen. They are tiny, little things with large black heads. In the Western United States, these cutworms are known as the Striacosta albicosta and are devastating to corn crops. In the Northeast, I believe that these eggs are those of the Noctua pronuba moth. In looking at Google images of our cutworm eggs, this identification appears to fit. This cleared up a mystery for us. In July, I saw this grapeleaf with all of these worms on it and flagged the plant. After consultation with my husband, we decided that so many "whatevers" can't be good, so we removed the leaf but did not know what it was:

Mystery solved and it was a good idea to remove the leaf at that time. Wikipedia lists one of the food sources of the Noctua pronuba or the Large Yellow Underwing Moth as Vitis.
Good references to read for more information include:
1. Wikipedia entry for: Noctua pronuba
2. Christina Difonzo¹ and Howard Russell², Noctua pronuba(Lepidoptera: Noctuidae): An Outbreak in Emails, ¹Department of Entomology, Michigan State University and ²Diagnostic Services, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, October, 2010.
3. Images for the Large Yellow Underwing Moth can be found here:
North American Moth Photographers Group.