The silkworm is the larva or caterpillar of Bombyx mori (Latin: "silkworm of the mulberry tree"), the domesticated silkmoth. A moth in the family Bombycidae, it is very important economically as the producer of silk. It is entirely dependent on humans for its reproduction and no longer occurs naturally in the wild. Silk culture has been practised for at least 5,000 years in China (Goldsmith et al. 2004). A silkworm's preferred food is White Mulberry leaves. It is native to northern China. Its nearest wild relative is Bombyx mandarina which is able to hybridize with the domestic taxon (Goldsmith et al. 2004), and which ranges from northern India to northern China, Korea and Japan. It is not known when the domestic silkmoth diverged from its wild relatives, only that the domestic population originated from inland Chinese rather than Japanese or Korean stock (Maekawa et al. 1988, Ar