Montana Field Guide

Adults of the Lesser Yellow Underwing Moth (Noctua comes) have pale brown camouflaged forewings and bright yellow-orange hindwings with hooked, dark border markings. The larvae are smooth and grayish with dark flecked markings (Natural England no date).

Shropshire and Tallamy (2025) provide a list, with synonymies, of 13,055 described native, exotic, and occasional straying Lepidoptera species of North America, north of Mexico; known but undescribed taxa, taxa with unresolved taxonomy, and excluded species are also included. The main manuscript includes links to supplementary materials, including a reference list for Lepidoptera of North America north of Mexico, and a filterable spreadsheet with information on taxonomy, synonymy, size ranges of species, distribution by state, province, and country with references, and host-plant Family and Genus associations with references.

In England, the larvae appear from September to October, hibernate and then reappear between April and June. The adults fly from July to September (Natural England no date).

Shropshire and Tallamy (2025) provide a link to a supplemental filterable spreadsheet with information on host-plant Family and Genus associations with references for all Lepidoptera species of North America, north of Mexico.

The larvae feed on various grasses, hawthorn, goat willow, blackthorn, hawthorn, sallow, heather, docks, foxglove and many other trees and plants (Natural England no date).