If moths are attracted to lights at night, why don't you see them in the day time!?

Question

I never see a moth in the day time?

Answer 1

The answer is obvious!!!
At night moths fly towards lights, in the day the biggest light is the sun, so they all clearly fly towards the sun! so we never see any on the day because they are way up high trying to reach the sun. lol

Answer 2

Moths use the bright lights of the sky to navigate. The light sources in the sky can be approximated to be so far away that a line connecting them to a moth will always be perpendicular to the earth, regardless of the moth's motion. More generally, light beams from the sky will always be the same angle to the earth, regardless of the moth's motion. Because of that, a moth can use a light beam from the sky (or even the sun) as a reference for its orientation. A moth can hold its angle with respect to a light beam constant, and the resulting trajectory of the moth will be in a straight line parallel to the earth at one altitude.

However, light sources generated here on earth are so close to moths that even small movements by a moth will cause large movements in the angle the light beam makes with the moth. This forces the moth to want to change its angle to compensate. In other words, the moth is assuming that the light beam is staying the same and the MOTH is going off course when in reality the moth is going in a straight line but the light beam is going off course. The result of this correction is that the moth tends to circle around a local light source.

Moths were adapted for environments that did not have LOCAL light sources. That's why they do not have a mechanism to tell the difference between a local light source and a distant light source. The moth treats both of them as references, which is why they get so confused around local light sources like light bulbs and fires.

So it is not that moths are attracted to light. It's just that when in the presence of a local light source, they tend to disorient and spiral into the light source.

In the daytime, there are not many local light sources. The moths have no trouble navigating.

At night, there are many local light sources that, to the moth, are equally as bright or brighter than the lights from the sky. Thus, they all start circling around local light sources. It turns out that as a moth tries to compensate for the changes in the angles between them and local light sources, they don't just circle but they spiral. Thus, local light sources tend to "collect" moths.

So in the daytime, moths are distributed pretty evenly. At night, when there are lots of local light sources, moths aren't distributed evenly. They cluster around light sources. Additionally, we don't "look" for them in the dark because we can't see in the dark. This makes it appear like there are moths "everywhere" simply because at night "everywhere" to us tends to be anywhere with a light source.

So in the daytime, when sunlight is abundant, moths spread out evenly and use the sun to navigate. This spreading out makes the DENSITY of moths so low that you don't see many of them during the day. (but they are out)

In the night time, local light sources pepper the earth, and moths spiral to them out of confusion.

(also keep in mind that the light colored wings of moths are less noticeable in the daytime)

Answer 3

i grew to become into as quickly as advised that their no longer honestly fascinated in the sunshine, their atempting to get in the back of it, get a fashion from it i think, which might additionally greater healthful with why they do no longer pop out into the solar.

Answer 4

'cause you never pull your wallet out in the day time.

Answer 5

Look closer, grasshopper.

Answer 6

You seem to have answered this yourself!

Answer 7

lol good point m8

Answer 8

http://www.howstuffworks.com/question675.htm
this should do you