Elephant Hawk-Moth

The elephant hawk-moth is a member of the sphinx or hawk moth family (Sphingidae), widespread across Europe and temperate Asia. It is one of the most colorful moths found in the region, with an unusual combination of olive-green and vivid pink scaling that makes it instantly recognizable to gardeners and naturalists alike.

The common name refers not to the adult moth but to its larva, which has a tapering, retractable front segment that the caterpillar can extend and contract in a way that resembles a small elephant's trunk, along with large eye-like markings near the head that serve as a startle display.

As with other hawk moths, adults are strong, fast fliers active mainly at dusk and after dark, and they play a role as pollinators of scented, tubular night-blooming flowers.

• Body and wings show a distinctive blend of olive-green and rose-pink, with pink stripes along the forewing margins and a pink-and-olive banded abdomen.
• Streamlined, narrow-winged sphinx moth body shape typical of the hawk moth family.
• Wingspan of roughly 2 to 2.75 inches.
• The caterpillar, more often noticed than the adult, is brown or green with a tapering trunk-like anterior end and two pairs of large dark eyespots, easily distinguished from other hawk moth larvae by this eyespot pattern.

Common throughout much of Europe and temperate Asia, found in gardens, hedgerows, riverbanks, wasteland, and woodland edges wherever its host plants, particularly willowherb and fuchsia, grow. Adults fly mainly at dusk and through the night during a single main summer flight period, and are attracted to sweet-scented flowers such as honeysuckle.

Adults are strong, agile fliers that hover at flowers after dark to feed on nectar through a long proboscis, favoring fragrant tubular blooms. Larvae feed on the foliage of willowherb, fuchsia, and bedstraw, and when threatened will retract the head end to inflate the eyespot-bearing segments, creating a snake-like startle display intended to deter predators. This defensive posture, combined with the trunk-like retractable front, gives the species both its common name and much of its ecological interest.

Eggs are laid singly on host plant leaves and hatch into small caterpillars that grow through several instars, developing the characteristic trunk shape and eyespots as they mature. Fully grown larvae pupate in a loose cocoon among leaf litter or just below the soil surface. The species is generally single-brooded in cooler climates with one generation per year, overwintering as a pupa and emerging as an adult moth in early summer.