Sunday, July 4, 2010

Teensy tiny

Caterpillars!About a week ago the boys brought over a dead leaf with four tiny, perfectly round eggs on it. Two days ago they hatched into the tiniest caterpillars I have ever seen. I could only find three out of the four, and they had mostly eaten their egg shells. Since the eggs were laid on an oak leaf I have given them a piece of oak to eat, but I have not seen much evidence of feeding yet.

To give a sense of size, the vial in the above photo is only two inches tall, about an inch wide. The caterpillars are about 3mm long. Not sure if an ID is even possible at this point, but they sure have some distinctive hairs.

If I don't see them eating the leaf soon, I'll transfer them to a larger enclosure with more plant choices. Would be really fun to watch these grow!

No comments: