Yponomeuta

In Bessans (High-Maurienne Valley), this group of wild cherry trees
offered a very sad aspect in the very hearth of July, since it had lost
almost all its leafs...

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The culprit for this desolation is a tiny white butterfly, called Ermine (Yponomeuta sp.), whose caterpillars can devore all leafs very rapidly.
	The caterpillars of this butterfly live in a collective cocoon they weave in the tree where they hatched in the springtime.
They feed on leaves and devore everything in their reach.		Then comes the time of pupation. The caterpillars form individual cocoons in the collective one where they lived.
	When the imagos appear, the wings are not yet functional. They must wait a little time, which leaves us the occasion to see the back wings, with their lead grey colour.

	Adult butterflies can also be seen on other plants...
		Sometimes very busy to propagate their genotype...
	However, the vitality of the trees is so strong that they produce rapidly new leaves, as soon as the strength of the attack declines.