Help with large caterpillar ID please

[MDE]

Hello there,

I'm another new user, simply because I found a rather lovely caterpillar on holiday in Donegal (NW Ireland). Apologies if this is a really common species, but I'd love to know what it is!

The two photographs show said caterpillar on my father's hand, and the caterpillar is somewhere between 1-2 inches in length. It was found on 11/7/10, wandering through a relatively recently cut front lawn which is located not far from the sea, sand dunes and scrubby bog/grassland.

Any further information gratefully received!

Many thanks,

MDE

[Trev Sawyer]

Hi MDE,
It's a Puss Moth caterpillar... very spectacular and if you touch them near the rear end, they produce little curly tufts from those two appendages to scare off predators

Trev

[Padfield]

Isn't it beautiful!

It's a puss moth (see: http://www.ukmoths.org.uk/show.php?id=4178). It feeds on aspen, as well as other poplars and willows, but yours may well be on the way to pupate somewhere. I'm not an expert on moths or breeding, so I hope someone else will advise on this - where to put it so as to maximise its chances of a successful pupation.

Guy

[Pete Eeles]

Yes, it looks like it's darkening in colour prior to pupating. This species builds an extremely robust cocoon in which to pupate, constructed from a mixture of silk and tree bark, typically.

The best thing to do is to place it on a suitable tree in case it still needs to feed - which would (as Guy suggests) be a willow, poplar or aspen. If it is looking to pupate, it will find a good patch on a branch or the tree trunk.

Although it will build a cocoon in a container (which will then be semi-transparent/white since no tree bark is involved), I don't recommend this!

Cheers,

- Pete

[Michaeljf]

Although it will build a cocoon in a container (which will then be semi-transparent/white since no tree bark is involved), I don't recommend this!

I certainly wouldn't recommend this. As a young lad these were one of the first caterpilllars I kept, and upon pupation time (as stated, when they turn more brown/purple-y) they wandered round in my cages for days, because I didn't know they'd need bark to pupate. I finally found this out, but it was too late for the poor caterpillars and they didn't survive pupation.

Since that incident if ever I kept puss moth caterpillars, I put some nice blocks of bark in with the caterpillars, and they had no problem pupating on the bark. Or you could just let the caterpillars go on walkabout in the garden etc...

[Cotswold Cockney]

Stick a few short Lombardy Poplar ( Populus nigra italica IIRC ) cuttings in your garden and most should soon root and produce nice upright saplings. Same with most Willows although the Broad Leaved Sallows are less easy to grow from cuttings.These will attract females of Poplar Hawks, Puss Moths and a few others and they will lay their ova ~ seen them fly in quickly lay and then away in seconds flat. Both produce large interesting larvae. When the Poplars become too large for a small garden, take some more cuttings and when they are established, remove the larger ones.... You may be luck and have that fine moth, the Red Underwing lay on willows in your garden. Seen them once or twice over the years.

The wooden fence panels next to the Poplars in my garden were used by the Puss Moth Larvae for pupation. They made a distinctive domed bulge in the fence panel about the size of a Dove's egg. The dome was matched with a shallow hollow in the wood to form a chamber where the pupae spend the winter. The dome being fashioned from the wood the larvae chewed to form the hollow, working the chewed wood to form the dome. How the hell did they learn to construct such a strong and effective home for the winter ...

The largest female Purple Emperor I ever bred was reared throughout its larval life on a Poplar. The ornamental Populus candicans aurea... I think it's size was simply down to pure coincidence rather than the different larval foodplant... but, who really knows.
.

[MDE]

To all the swift replies, thank you very much!

Lots of additional interesting information to think about, and willows, aspens and poplars to starting hunting about in! I hope it doesn't appall the contributors to know that I was actually on holiday during that period, and not knowing what to do with the caterpillar, I just placed it back where we found it...

I'm a phycologist by trade, and this just proves that I need to start keeping my eyes open in terrestrial habitats a little bit more!

Thank you again,

MDE

[Trev Sawyer]

On the contrary MDE, you did exactly the right thing... The caterpillar would almost certainly have found a decent area to pupate in on its own. As others have said, it might not have been so easy had it been placed in an empty jamjar as many would have been tempted to do.

Trev