Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center
Wingspan 3.8 cm. Forewing is pale gray with a thin white hook-shaped stigma and a broad black median band below the stigma; hindwing is yellow with a broad black submarginal band. This noctuid is widely distributed in high elevation conifer forests of the Cascade Mountains and northern Rocky Mountains. Moths fly in midsummer. Caterpillars feed on the foliage of huckleberry (Vaccinium).
Similar species: several species are found in high elevation conifer forests and have a yellow-black banded hindwing; Syngrapha ignea forewing with a large curved stigma, widely distributed; Syngrapha sackenii forewing with a long, straight stigma and is endemic to the Rocky Mountains; Autographa sansoni forewing is mottled red-brown with a curved stigma, hindwing pale yellow; Syngrapha epigaea and Autographa ampla have a gray hindwing.