At the recent moth night I hosted where I work, we were fortunate to see several of the big and beautiful tulip-tree silkmoths.  About an hour into the activity, a dozen or so people were gathered around a blacklight when one of the tulip-tree silkmoths arrived.  It took a few minutes for it to settle, but everyone got really excited.  Lots of cameras came out and everyone was sitting there with their cameras ready to snap a photo as soon as the moth stayed still long enough to get a decent photo.  When it finally did settle on a net held by one of the volunteers, everyone surged toward the moth at once!  Flashes flashed, there were hands and cameras everywhere, and by some miracle the moth wasn’t scared away by all the people suddenly crowded around it.  I happened to be standing back a little ways, so I snapped a photo of the crowd around the moth once the it thinned enough to see what was going on:

Excited by moths

It makes me happy to see so many people completely enthralled by a single moth!  That’s what I always hope to see at moth nights, but sometimes you get a crowd that just isn’t that into the experience.  These people…  Well, let’s just say they’re my kind of people.  :)

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