Are there any common household moths known to have parasites?

Question

We keep getting fat fuzzy moths that fly into my apartment (Our complex has no screen doors, for some reason.). Whenever I kill one, there is some other creature inside. The first one had a slender green insect with four wings. Another had something I couldn't quite make out that tried to crawl out of the corpse.

I wonder if there is some species of moth that simply survives this why, or if it's some bizarre parasitic phenomena.

I live in Eastern Washington, if that makes a difference.

Answer 1

Most critters do have parasites.

In fact, most people get fibromyalgia not from the parasite they get from their pets, but from a bacteria that comes off that parasite. The bacteria waits until the person's cell walls respirate to take in water, air and food, and while the cell wall is open, the bacteria moves in and breeds... making painful knots in the muscle tissue.

Answer 2

Practically every organism, including bacteria, can and will have some sort of parasite. However, I have never heard of this before!

Answer 3

Any insect can have a parasite.  The most common ones infecting caterpillars and the adult moths are because of parasitic wasps.

I have personally seen a caterpillar being harassed by one of these little guys.  

What the wasp does, is fly around the moth or butterfly larvae until she gets that moment when she can insert her ovapositer under the skin.  She lays a single egg inside it.  When the egg hatches, the wasp larvae slowly begins to feed on the insides of the caterpillar.   If the caterpillar is close to pupating, and it changes into a moth or butterfly, then the parasite is passed on to the adult stage of that moth or butterfly.

The parasitic wasp larvae will eventually kill the host, pupate itself, and out comes an adult wasp.

These wasps do a great deal of good and help keep our planet healthy.  They do their part in keeping moth and butterfly larvae under control.  Everything is balanced in nature.  All it needs is for man not to interfere.