First, I'm not a butterfly guy. Nothing against them...I like them, I just don't know much about them. I've been learning more today, though, as I found two caterpillars eating up the leaves on a very young tulip poplar I planted this spring. I have ID'ed them as Tiger Swallowtail larvae, and read a few pages of their habits on the internet.
They're about an inch long at this point, in their final growth stage. From what I've read, they're not too far from pupating.
Now the questions. These guys have eaten about three leaves off a tree that only had about a dozen leaves to begin with. Are they almost done? If I'm only going to lose one or two more, I'll leave them alone. If they're going to strip my tree bare, we've got to do something. One of their other host species is the choke cherry, and I have an abundance of them that I could transfer them to, if you more knowledgeable folks think that would work without too much trauma to the little fellas.
I know I'm too picky, but I want my trees and my butterflies, too!
Tiger Swallowtail caterpillar eating my tulip poplar leaves
I've been planting lots of trees on our property and I don't consider you picky at all. It takes a lot of time, effort and money to plant trees. Since the tulip poplar is so young and the cats would accept choke cherry as well, I'd carefully move them to the choke cherry tree. As long as they still have food, I don't see where it could cause any harm. Sounds like a good compromise to me.
I'd love a picture of the "pigs" Jeff!
Adrienne
PS I'm green with jealousy! :)
What kind of a tree is choke cherry jeff? I am looking to put one tree in that supports a wide range of Butterfly caterpillars....I have not read about that one.....Is it a tall tree and does it produce fruit?
Jack,
Small tree, large shrub. Mine are three years old and about 12 feet high. I have about a dozen of them as the foundation planting on one side of a metal building.
Here's a link to the wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chokecherry
I'll take some pics this afternoon of both the cats and the trees.
Okay, Adrienne, here's a pic of one of the little gluttons. I moved them from my tulip poplar to one of my chokecherries. They seem happy as clams. In the pic you can kind of see that they weave a web and elevate themselves above the leaf to rest.
Jack, here's a pic of the largest of my chokecherries.
Planted as a twig three years ago.
First year we've had fruit. Not much, but what's there has been much enjoyed by our birds.
Here's the one I've sacrificed to the Tigers...it's leafy enough I'm not concerned about it.
Jeff, when those 'piglets' elevate themselves in a silk-web like that. If I'm not mistaken they're in the transitional phase of pupation. I raised a sphinx caterpillar last year. I noticed that was how it did when I didn't have soil and debris for them to hide to pupate. I'm too green with envies, I would love to see some of those fellas here.
Ok...the Chokecherry is exactly the size I am looking for....thanks for sharing jeff. What nursery did you get your from?
Jack, I got them from the Missouri Department of Conservation Nursery. $7 for 25 seedlings. Sorry, MO residents only. :-( They shouldn't be too hard to find.
Lily, The "elevate to rest" comment is something I found in my web research that is specific to this species. They go brown before they start to pupate.
Thanks Jeff.....I am on it already.....
Good luck with your little hungry hungry hippos
Thank you Jeff, very interesting info that you've shared.
Kim
Since I've raised those, I thought about why they have those silky webs to rest on in the later instars. I have a few theories. First, maybe it help them stay on the leaves if wind gets bad. Or if rainy, it might help them stay dry if rain is running over the leaf. If it webs two leaves together in such a way that one is partly over the cat, It might not only help with rain, it could also help them hide from predators while it's doing an instar...or at any time. Just my thoughts on that. Here's one with 2 leaves webbed together. And Jeff, congrats on the visitors to your host plants and so glad you posted!
Very jealous here too! So glad you checked to see what they were and didn't spray or squish like so many people do. Good job, you will be blessed with beautiful butterflies!
Over all, the cat. is the cutest! I love to see the pix above with its "eyes" marking in attempt to ward off predators. Mother Nature works her magic! I just love these little ones. Thank you, for your post on DG so many others like myself can enjoy and learn more about these tiny wonders.