A Few More Insects at the Farm
Mike and I found a beautiful big caterpillar crawling across the driveway a few days ago. It's a Giant Leopard Moth caterpillar (Ecpantheria scribonia).
It's very striking - about 2 1/2 inches long, with shiny black bristles and bright red bands and spiracles.
It rolls up into a tight circle when I disturb it.
It will spend the winter as an almost grown caterpillar, and make its cocoon in the spring. I kept it in a cage for a few days and it happily ate lilac leaves. But I decided I didn't want to risk trying to keep over the winter, so I released it.
One of my slug caterpillars made a cocoon. It's either the Jeweled Tailed Slug caterpillar, or the Yellow Shouldered Slug caterpillar. When I looked through the leaves where they were hanging out, they had both disappeared, and I found one cocoon. It's quite small - about 1/2 an inch long. Hopefully I'll be able to watch it next spring and see what comes out.
My Giant Swallowtail caterpillars are continuing to grow. It's a race to see if they can finish their caterpillar stages before the leaves of the prickly ash drop off.
This is one of the bigger ones - it's about 2 inches long.
I've got them in separate cages now - ice cream buckets with lids cut open and lined with plastic screening.
I thought I would show you what my caterpillar raising set up looks like. This is on our screened porch, so they're exposed to outside temperatures.
The small cages on the shelves are for smaller caterpillars, the large ones on the floor are mostly Giant Silk Moths - Lunas, Polyphemus and Cecropias. I'd love to see other people's set ups. I'm outgrowing my space, and I'd like to get some other ideas.
Marcie