Tom Murray usually photographs moths in New England and he has found "typical" bella there. He found a fairly typical ornatrix at McAllen, in the southern Rio Grande Valley of Texas. Paula Kennedy encountered ornatrix near Galveston, Texas. So far we have no photos of this form from southern Florida. Alan Chin-Lee might be just a little too far north to encounter it at Gainesville, FL.

Within forms there can be considerable variation in appearance. Colors can range from yellow or orange through pink or red, or the markings other than black can be largely absent. Giff Beaton provides us with three varieties from southeastern Georgia. Giff's lightly marked yellowish moth is matched by Lois Stacey's lightly marked pinkish variant from South Carolina.

Alan's caterpillar seems to match the photo of a bella in Dave Wagner's field guide. Machele White's cats (about 65 miles south of Alan) look a bit different. They are shown here with their favorite food, seedpods of the Rattlebox Plant, Crotalaria mucronata. Normally they spend their time inside the seedpods eating the seeds (from which they acquire defensive chemicals which is the subject of the research of Tom Eisner and his colleagues -- see references). The caterpillars perform a final molt as they become prepupae. The shed skin can be seen beside the cat as well as beside the pupa that it became. The pupal skin or case darkens with age, taking on a varnished appearance.