Moths vs Butterflies 

Highly educational with a hint of Skyrim ... you win the internet, Emily.

"Or luna moths which are etherial and gorgeous & can be used to fortify light armor potions in Skyrim" I'm in love :)

I lost it at the Skyrim comment.

It's interesting how English has all these different words for things in biology... and science in general, I think. In Finnish there's no special word for "chrysalis". All the cocoon-like things insects create are just called "kotelo". Which also means just "case", like a box for keeping stuff in or something. Also moths are just called "night butterflies" ("yöperhoset", butterflies being "perhoset"; the singular is "perhonen" because the -nen words in Finnish are weird). I have no idea what you'd call diurnal moths in Finnish. o_o Okay now I need to look it up. Okay, I totally forgot that there's another word for moths: "yökkönen". That comes the word for night too ("yö"; I'd explain how to pronounce it but neither of those vowels exist in English. It's [yø] in IPA. If you know German then it's basically like "üö" we just spell ü with a y). The name means something like... idk, little night creature? And apparently yökkönen is used scientifically to refer to Noctuidae specifically. So it's not all moths. Though I'm pretty sure people use it to mean just moths too. Then there's "mittarit" ("measurers") (Geometridae), kiitäjät "dashers" (Sphingidae) and karvakehrääjät ("hairspinners") (Lasiocampidae) for other specific names. Which are indeed specific, you wouldn't just use those for all moths. I guess "yöperhonen" really doesn't mean "moth" but just "nocturnal butterfly OR moth". And now I know! (Sorry, all that probably didn't interest anyone but me.)

The skyrim reference!!!!!!!! Lmao "and the best way to remember this is butterflies make chrysalises and moths make cacoons"

|.| Butterflies -.- Moths

You didnt mention the rosy maple moth! you guys google it for your daily aww moment. it's adorable.

i am a simple man you mention skyrim i leave a thumbs up!

Excellent Skyrim reference!! Represent!

im here to see the skyrim comments

Man, I sure hope the next version of Mothra gets acidic spit. She's been missing out.

So this proves, ONCE AND FOR ALL, that Mothra is a MOTH! If you've ever argued about Godzilla movies, this will make sense to you...

I was putting all my attention to Emily's face that I got startled when I noticed the racoon.

I've never been a huge animal fan so these videos aren't always super interesting to me. However, I love watching your videos because your energy is so fantastic. Watching you talk about this stuff makes me want to smile because your energy is so contagious.

The Skyrim reference.. oh god, my sides....

I always liked moths.

had to come and say my 4yr old love this! this is her favorite video so far ( we dont show her the dissection videos, we are weird but not crazy). she will be playing with her dolls and take ones arms up to say , " butterflies... ", then down to say , " moths. " so proud! :)

Moths are just so much more epic. Butterfly says "I'm going to cover my body in spit during puberty and break open my dried spit to become a fragile weak thing with color, so nice." Moth says "I'm going to make an epic fort out of all the things and spit acid at it to escape and emerge as a hardocore buff flying machine, with the sacrifice of m color!"

I love how this show doesn't pretend to be "accessible" like SciShow and gets straight into the nerdiness and memes with no unnecessary foreplay.

"Nobody suspects the butterfly..." -Bart Simpson -

Moths... butterflies... I am terrified of them both, all because of that stupid Spongebob episode that always gives me terrifying nightmares

I work at a day care and one of my three year olds proudly told everyone in her class that the flying creature they were watching was a moth, not a butterfly and she even told them how she knew. I was pretty impressed.

you forgot invisibility potions :P

"Anyway, they have sex." /deadpan awesome

When the Luna Moth part came around, I was convinced that my mind could alter the content of a RU-vid video to best reflect my nerdthoughts for a few seconds. Then I remembered I didn't take a psionic class.

How can we tell the difference between scales and hair? I thought they were both made out of the same stuff. But there must be more. I'm going to play with the internet.

As someone who is scared of both butterflies and moths, this whole episode was terrifying.

I LOVE these kinds of episodes (like horns vs antlers) because you break down things so simply that I can actually walk away saying that I learned something. Not that I don't learn from your other videos this is just less complex.

I'm terrified of moths/butterflies and this video made me feel better

Is voicing the "th" in "moths" an American thing? I've never heard that before.

Question: why are moths and butterflies classified with species and not breeds? As in, Monarch Butterflies, Viceroy Butterflies, and Queen Butterflies are considered different species, but they're not even that different. Whereas, a Chihuahua, a Siberian Husky, and a Charles Spaniel are the same species, but different breeds. Could someone explain this to me?

butterflies are skinny while moths are thicc.

I actually use a mod for Skyrim which adds a ton of butterflies/moths to Skyrim. Of course, they're sacrificed to make Alchemy potions, but still.

I laughed a lot in this episode! :') Plus, I learned a lot that I hadn't had a clue about before. I didn't even know the difference between cocoons and chrysalises :O Thanks for all the knowlage, guys!

YAY I FOUND THE EPISODE WITH THE SKYRIM REFERENCE! Your so awesome Emily.

Great show. The writing on this one was totally fabulicious. Grats to both Emily and Michael. :)

Who needs P90x when you can do the Graslie-Lepidoptera calisthenics!

omg skyrim reference marry me

The plural of chrysalis is chrysalids I am told

Lepidopteraphobia is a terrible affliction. This was interesting, but I am so horrified and itchy D:

The Madagascar moth seems to not comply with the belly nor antennae criteria... :-/

Oh the skyrim quotes lol

I had a hard day, but this genuinely made me feel much better. Thank you Brain Scoop People!

I have to harvest them boys in skyrim now

Butterflies (except for Skippers). Moths. Butterflies (except for Skippers). Moths. Butterflies (except for Skippers). Moths.

Lol at the Skyrim reference.

Way to general! Both turn into a pupa stage. Not all moths spin cocoons. Way to general!

Two of your three counterexamples are wrong. Charaxinae rest with wings closed, but, according to scientists, BASK with them open. They warm themselves up with the sun; they don't always rest with them open. Also, Lepidoptora have scaly wings, but soft bodies. The only completely true part of your comment is the filiform moths.

Heeey, the madagascar moth has thin antennas unlike what you said before.

TheBrainScoop Exercise, Butterflies and moths... Butterflies and moths... Butterflies and moths... Butterflies and moths... .. now breathe.. Thanks Emily. you rock!

okay i know this video is 7 years old but PLEASE take that dimetrodon skull off that shelf you’re giving me anxiety. that’s just a cast, right? RIGHT???

Kakuna evolves into beedrill which is a bee or a wasp or whatnot anyhow its not a moth something closer would be venonat but that doesnt really have a cocoon stage to evolving to venomoth but burmy which changes depending on where it fights (leaf , ground , steel) and if its a male it evolves into a mothim which is a moth pokemon which then would be a better comparison since this is a video about moths and butterflies not about bees wasps or what ever kind of evil thing beedrill is.

Couple notes: there are many moths that do not have feathery antennae, including common ones; the wing spreading heuristic also may not work, as skippers tend to hold their wings outstretched, and many butterflies do when basking. Same with the abdomens. Really, there's no good way of telling moths and butterflies apart completely, since moths are disparate groups of Lepidoptera, some closely related to butterflies, others distantly. Kind of like "reptiles" or "fish".

I'm disappointed by the many inaccuracies and half truths: butterflies often rest with the their wings open (Charaxinae to name but one genus) many butterflies have scaled and thick bodies (lepi in Lepidoptera denotes scales) eg. Coeliadinae and many moths have filiform antennae (eg. Cossidae genus) even her example of the sunset moth (Chrysiridia rhipheus) is an example against many of her rules. My examples cited are not even exceptions. I'm very disappointed.

You can improve on your taxonomy skills. Butterflies and moths are Lepidoptera which have scaled wings. Lepidoptera are Endopterygota which means their wings develop inside their body (cocoon/chrysalis). Endopterygota are Pterygota which means they have wings. Pterygota are insects which means they have external mouth parts. Insects are Hexapoda which means they have six legs. Hexapoda are Arthropods, which means their legs are divided into different parts. Now you are up to speed.

"Butterflies form chrysalises and moths form cocoons, and the easiest way to remember that is BUTTERFLIES FORM CHRYSALISES AND MOTHS FORM COCOONS." Brilliant.

That's... a GREAT hypotesis, but kakuna even when the name came from cocoon, it's a crysalid, or more likely a pupa! I have tenebrio molitor as pets and they make pupa that look EXACTLY like kakuna :o Comically the larvae of tenebrio molitor also looks like a weedle, but the scarab looks like a... scarab.

Here is the thing, I just want to say how glad i am that this stuff exists. I don't know who I would be without this as my defining quirk, but I would definitely be a duller, less informed little human. For that I thank you (do you have it in your hear to like this so the people I'm thanking get a chance to see it??? Pwetty Pwease?)

I think it's more than good enough for teaching people how to identify what they have on their hands for the most part =) With there being multiple factors listed, it's unlikely that any one of the species will break all of them at once, so I'm pretty sure it's fine =) If you wanted a hardcore guide, I don't think RU-vid is really the place.

Good job with this episode! Could you make a video about dragonflies? They are so misterious and exciting and beautiful and perhaps you can find some extra refefrences about them in the Skyrim... which i'm not sure of... never played it... but DRAGONFLIES ARE COOL! :D Keep up with the good work! You are (the whole Brain Scoop Team) my exemplars! Thanks for your hard work!

Tis be the tale of the moth and his flame. He lived life early in his safe Cocoon. Upon hatching in light he doth proclaim, 'Is this the light of my beautiful moon?' Twas not, for 'twas the home of soon found love. Coming from the beauty of wings above.~The Moth and The Butterfly, first Stanza, by myself. For your enjoyment.

Emily, How is it that we know that things find their way through transverse orientation? I mean, did scientists watch things at night and found that they were more active when the moon was bright, or do they travel in the direction of the moon? I mean, how do we know that its the moon thats guiding them?

I uses to like butterflies and moths equally, but then i heard that butterflies tasted with their feet and drink blood, then i liked moths more, then i heard about two species of moth,, one drinks blood from the finges and toes, the other drinks terás from sleeping birds. Then i became terrified of both. Also, fuck auto correct.

I'm sorry but I'm a pedant and I took notes. Moths have feather antennae, butterflies filiform... #notallmoths... (So many of the Pyraloids; the burnets even have clubbed antennae a-la-butterflies) Moths form a cocoon.... #notallmoths (although most pupae are not as attractive as chrysalises) Butterflies rest with their wings together and up and moths rest with their wings down on either side of their plump little bodies #notallmoths AND #notallbutterflies (e.g. skippers) Butterflies have typically long and slender abdomens while moths are going to be fuller in shape... #notallmoths AND #notallbutterflies (again, Skippers will do for the butterflies, and for the moths, many of the pearl moths and plume moths are very slender) (The Skippers also defy the smooth bodies, as do a number of the Blues/Coppers/Hairstreaks, among others - but then, some of the skippers are also night-active, so...)

For some reason when you said that "Moths have little scales to keep them warm through lonely nights but Butterflies don't have any" I thought you meant butterflies don't have lonely nights and I was expecting "because Butterflies are sluts and sleep together."

bruh that racoon scared me but also that moth i seen on my ceiling that touched my cheek and heard my loud scream and thomps down the hallway literally 5 minutes ago yup i literally youtubed moths just to find out about this im still shaking like lmao

In am a French speaking Biologist. The problem you underline here doesn't exist in French. We use the vernacular term "papillon' (butterfly as the whole lepidoptera group) encompassing both groups, adding a different epithet if we want to dissociate both groups : 'papillon diurne' (vernacular lingua : 'papillon de jour', [day's butterfly, diurnal butterfly]) and 'papillon nocturne' (vern l. : 'papillon de nuit', [night's butterfly, nocturnal butterfly]). Even if the vernacular lingua does not have the precision of the scientific nomenclature, it is a pretty good 'working distinction'. In the province of Quebec we know the usual terms in English, those you talk about in this video, and also know they don't literally translate from one to the other.

I work for a nature education center, and I'm pretty sure I need to integrate the moth/butterfly arm movements somewhere into our kids programs.

didn't expect the Skyrim reference and I got confused on the process XD. I picked a big moth when I was younger on a tree but it was so lazy I thought I killed it, now I remember I let it go when I was afternoon so probably not... still -.-

Hey Emily, the Madagascar Sunset Moth has long antennae like a butterfly. Are there tufts at the end that can't be made out in the video? Or is the definition of moths have tufts and butterflies have long slender antennae not so strict? Are there exceptions?

Why do moths and other insects fly toward bright lights anyway? I know it's partly because they use natural lights to navigate, but the don't fly endlessly toward the moon or milky way, so why do they fly endlessly into a light bulb?

A fine hypothesis, but that wouldn't explain why adult female butterflies lay eggs that hatch into a different species. (caterpillar) Also, there's this stuff called DNA, which answers that whole "how do we know" question you previously stated.

Hey what's with the uncredited use of stuff from Hyperbole And a Half at 1:22? Allie Brosh is awesome and you could oh I dunno, give credit... links... Something. I seem to remember some talk on vlogbrothers about ownership and credit. Ahem.

That was most interesting and informative. I'm a physicist not a zoologist but I like to think I am fairly well-informed. However, I hadn't really thought about the distinction between chrysalises and cocoons. I knew that silk moths made a cocoon out of silk (obviously) but that was as far as my thinking on the subject had gone. Thank you Emily, I love learning new things.

“To make the transition into adulthood the body inside the casing has to liquify and literally rebuild itself. In comparison [our puberty] doesn’t seem that bad.” Not really cuz you just described exactly how I feel when I get my period every month.

Moths are evil....o.k. I know that they are not a actually evil but they have freaked me out since I was a little kids when I woke up one night with a hundred on them flying around my bedroom. No idea how they got there.

I sort of like that it's more educational now (albeit a bit more scripted). I mean it was before, but now she has a poop ton of professionals with terminal degrees at her fingertips that can help her help us learn :)

I never liked moths and butterflies. They're beautiful from far away but when you get closer they're really scary and gross. Just like some people (and I don't mean their looks btw, but their personality).

I thought that moths had chrysalises inside their cocoons and what about moths that fold their wings into their backs and I've seen butterfly's sit with their wings parallel or at a very low angle to the ground

When you said that butterflies have chrysalises and moths have cocoons, and that the easy way to remember was that butterflies have chrysalises and moths have cocoons, that actually is helping me remember that. WTF?

great great great I very much enjoyed this video! Also, having a moth smack into your face because you are using a headlamp to see what you are doing at night is the worst thing I can think of in relation to moths.

Unpopular opinion: I've always preferred moths to butterflies. A lot of my friends are afraid of moths but not butterflies and I just don't get it... They're not THAT different, and they're fluffy with prettier antennae!

With Moths and Butterflies, the first life stage is the Ovum or Egg, the second stage the Larva (Larval stage) or Caterpillar, the third stage the Pupa (Pupal stage) is known as a ‘Chrysalis’ and finally it becomes the ‘Imago’ or adult, obviously commonly termed the actual ‘butterfly’ or ‘moth’. So a Chrysalis is the pupa stage of a Moth or Butterfly (Lepidoptera). A Cocoon is a casing of spun silk produced by many insects to form a protective covering for the Pupa. Many Moth Caterpillars for example produce silk cocoons. Cocoons can be of various types, from hard to soft, with various colours dependent on the species involved. Many people state that a Moth Pupa is enclosed in a Cocoon and a Butterfly Pupa is enclosed in a Chrysalis. However, the proper use of the terms is that the Chrysalis is the term for the Butterfly or Moth Pupa itself, and Cocoon is a protective silk covering. The fact that few, if any, Butterfly species produce protective silk Cocoons and the majority of Moths do is probably the root of this misinterpretation. So to summarise the Pupa is a life stage that some insects go through, between the larva and adult stages. A Chrysalis is the name of a Moth or Butterfly (Lepidoptera) pupa. A Cocoon is a protective covering around the Pupae or Chrysalis. animalsunlimited.co.uk/what-is-the-difference-between-a-cocoon-a-chrysalis-and-a-pupa/

Moths are paraphyletic. The term 'Moth' is one of convenience (or grade) like 'fish' - unless one considers 'butterflies' a kind of moth, of course.

Royce da 59's Caterpillar ft Eminem brought me here 😂🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Thank you, I came here to say this. It's teaching dodgy science and misleading to ignore the many overlaps and taxonomy controversies in classifying lepidoptera into moths and butterflies.

0:20 I was like "what Luna moths are real?!?... nah they must be based off what ever kind of moth that is...hmmm" then 3:39 "whaaaaaaaa That's what they are called?! And Emily made a Skyrim reference?!?!

I love luna moths! I have caught the most beautiful one for my entomology class in undergrad and I have it framed in my room at home. (funny story I caught it on a literal quidditch pitch)

Half way the skyrim reference I was like "Reinforce arm.." REINFORCE ARMOR, WAIT WAT? MOTH ABUSE? :O But then I heard skyrim and remembered I only killed a butterfly like once so I felt good with myself...

That was the first time that cocoons only refer to the hard casing of moths. I wouldn't say that my childhood was a lie but was all a big misconception! So, butterflies, chrysalis; moths, cocoons.

This video is 7 years old, but I'm going to say it anyway. The majority of moth features she mentioned are from saturniid moths (fat, fuzzy, feathery atteneae), there are tons and tons of moths that are almost identical to butterflies morphologycally speaking. Damn, some even look like wasps.

Huh, i always called the butterfly ones “cocoons” good to know the difference.Also the skyrim joke earned a subscribe.

I'm so happy that y'all made this video. It's something I've always wondered but never Googled. Now I can tell everyone they"re wrong when saying that butterflies emerge from cocoons.

one of my pet peeves is when people call that white butterfly you see everywhere in the summer a freaking moth I will gladly argue with them also, SKYRIM!!!!

I saw a cocoon being built ones it was epic but it seemed that a caterpillar that wasn't going to be in it was helping so I was worried about the last caterpillar not having help.

that skyrim reference my heart cannot take the beauty of this women I tell you

I remember in elementary school they tried to give us all of these mnemonics to remember the cardinal directions. I just remembered them by thinking "North, South, East, West".

I was just thinking that myself. I know it's updated on a regular basis, but each time I watch it I feel that sense of relief like I had been affectionately missing it for weeks.

That's awesome. I played a hybrid - Thief/Archer/Assassin, worked out pretty well. That statement in the video sounded as if you were explaining a recipe during a cooking show :)

The program is awesome! It is entertaining and very fun to watch! But sadly, I showed to my gf and now she's in love with Emily and olny talk about her. Damn you Emily! ):