[5][6] This species is a seasonal migrant that travels north in the spring and south in the fall to escape extreme temperatures in the summer and winter.

[7] In the span of 2 months, the moth progresses through the life cycle stages egg, larvae, pupa, and adult.

[9] Populations of this species have been found in southern Canada, 48 of the United States (and additionally Hawaii), Mexico, Central and South America, Australia, New Zealand, the Pacific Rim, North Africa, Europe, and Asia.

[2] However, they are absent from some tropical regions and colder areas and are more widespread in the Northern than Southern Hemisphere.

[5] Larvae feed on weeds such as bluegrass, curled dock, lambsquarters, yellow rocket, and redroot pigweed.

Favored crops include most vegetable plants, alfalfa, clover, cotton, rice, sorghum, strawberry, sugarbeet, tobacco, and occasionally grains and grasses.

They are also attracted to deciduous trees and shrubs such as linden, wild plum, crabapple, and lilac.

After this growth, though, the moths are drawn more to low, dense plants such as the curled dock and yellow rocket.

Larval development is optimized at a temperature of 27 degrees Celsius, and instars 1–5 are most successful at higher humidities.

The forewings are dark brown, and the distal area has a light irregular band a black dash mark.

Before migration southward in the fall, the reproductive system in both females and males shuts down to prevent copulation before winter.

In the spring and early summer, though, before migration north, females release sex pheromones soon after eclosion.

Larvae parasitized by Meteorus leviventris, a type of parasitoid, eat 24% less vegetation and cut 36% fewer seedlings.

Other parasitoids include several fly species such as Archytas cirphis, Bonnetia comta, Gonia sequax,[12] Eucelatoria armigera and Sisyropa eudryae.

[5] Ants, specifically Lasius neoniger also prey on this species and feed on A. ipsilon eggs.

[8] An entomopathogenic nematode called Hexamermis arvalis is known to infect 60% of larvae in the central United States.

So, PBAN is what connects the network in the CA to the central nervous system's production of sex pheromone.

However, when decapitated females (meaning complete absence of the CA) were injected with a synthetic form of JH, ovaries were able to develop.

These proteins are responsible for recognizing sex pheromone and general odorants, such as those released by host plants.

[5] Other crops where serious damage occurs include cotton, maize, tobacco, sunflower, tomatoes, sugar beet and potato.

Soil insecticides can be applied as a pre-plant treatment, although this may be limited by the unpredictability of cutworm population density distribution.