Caterpillar ID - dried blooms, buds and leaves stuck to it?

Howdy All,

Does anyone know what kind of caterpillar this is??? This is one heck of a camouflaged cat!!!

I found it on my duranta purple sky flower bush. It is about 3/4 long and moves along in an inch worm fashion. It is a purplish mauve color with white feet and a white head.

It does not appear to be preparing to pupate - but yet it has all sorts of debris stuck to it - pieces of dried duranta blooms, buds and leaves. It just moves along munching as it goes. I found it when I was tracking a trail of cat poo :o)

Am in the south tip of Texas (zone 9).

~ Cat

...another photo of that weird caterpillar

~ Cat

Cat
you sure are coming up with some strange critters out there!! interesting!!

Hmm, I don't have any idea either, but .. could it be, that this guy is collecting his/her personal 'debris' .. in which to 'encapsulate' himself .. eventually (?) .. Or, jes as you stated, simply using his God given gift of camo ...

Glad you posted the pics tho' .. for he's sure nuff a mitey interesting lil specimen.

Hope that someone will come along soon .. and hep out with the ID for ya ..

- Magpye

I hope someone can ID it too :o) If not, well I'll just have to wait and see what it turns into.

This has been the season for odd finds in my yard. First the rare rekoa marius caterpillars...then this guy...and I still have another pupa I'm waiting on (found that on milkweed - right where all the aphids hang out) and a couple of other cats I haven't gotten around to identifying yet.

I'll be happy just so long as they don't turn out to be predatory bugs! I've found lots of different eggs...and they were all truly beautiful too...but don't ya know it...dratted things turned out to be predatory bugs. A no-no around my butterfly cats.

~ Cat

Look at this thread of mine from August. It might be the same thing.

http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/539213/