Red-bordered Wave

Idaea demissaria · Order: Lepidoptera · Family: Geometridae

Also called: Red-Bordered Wave Moth

No source yet on danger. We have no source yet on whether it bites, stings or damages anything.
Red-bordered Wave
Photo: Laura Gaudette, CC BY

The red-bordered wave is a geometrid moth. It lives in North America.

Source: Wikipedia

How to recognize it

It belongs to the family Geometridae.

Source: Wikipedia

Where it is found in the US

Recorded in 45 of 51 states and DC. Most records: Alabama, Georgia, Texas, North Carolina, Florida, Oklahoma, Colorado, California.

Darker = more records. Counts are museum and citizen-science records, not population size.

Source: GBIF

Status: native in North America; native in Canada; native in United States. Source: iNaturalist

Months it is reported in the US

JFMAMJJASOND

Source: GBIF

More photos

Red-bordered Wave photo 3
Photo: David Dodd, CC BY
Red-bordered Wave photo 4
Photo: unknown, CC0
Red-bordered Wave photo 5
Photo: unknown, CC0
Red-bordered Wave photo 6
Photo: Ken-ichi Ueda, CC BY

Same family (Geometridae)

Sources

  • Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaea_demissaria

Look it up elsewhere: GBIF · iNaturalist · BugGuide · ITIS · Wikipedia

Text written 2026-10-23 from the sources above and checked sentence by sentence against them. Data fetched 2026-10-23.

How this page works

This is one bug's fact sheet. The colored box at the top says whether it is dangerous. Sections below cover how to recognize it, whether it is a pest, and how to deal with it. The US map shows which states have records; tap a state to see other bugs there.

Every fact on Bug FAQ comes from a named source (university extension sites, government agencies, GBIF, iNaturalist, Wikipedia). The source is linked next to each section. If we have no source for something, we leave it out.