Wordless Wednesday: Gulf Fritillary caterpillars munching passionvine

Clever little caterpillar!

I've been documenting the development of Spicebush Swallowtail caterpillars on my recently planted spicebush. It only took the butterflies a few short days to find it and begin laying eggs on it.

Here was one of several tiny eggs that I found on the bush after watching a female swallowtail visiting it.

A few days later, I discovered that the eggs had hatched and I found seven of these little guys on various leaves. They bore a striking resemblance to bird poop and each was motionless on its leaf, obviously an adaptation to protect the newly-hatched caterpillars from the notice of predators.

Today when I stopped by to check on the caterpillars, I immediately noticed that several of the leaves had been nibbled and folded over. Examining the folded leaf, I found it was stitched together with a kind of silk and that there was a tiny Spicebush caterpillar inside the pocket that was formed.

Back inside, I pulled my John and Gloria Tveten field guide, Butterflies of Houston and Southeast Texas, from the shelf to read about the Spicebush Swallowtail. The Tvetens had written, "The larvae feed primarily at night, hiding during the day within a rolled leaf stitched with silk." So my caterpillars were performing exactly as Spicebush Swallowtails are known to perform. I had just never seen it because I've never had Spicebush caterpillars before.

Caterpillars are easy prey for hungry wasps and other predators and so they have to develop defensive measures to protect themselves. The rolled leaf is one of the most effective and it is used by several types of caterpillars, most notoriously the "leaf-rollers" that make a mess of our canna leaves during summer. Pretending to be a bird dropping is another defense. The clever little Spicebush caterpillars use both of these strategies and no doubt increase their survival rate accordingly.

Future Queens

Wandering through the garden early this morning, checking the status of some recently planted plants, my eye was caught by something colorful against the green stem of a milkweed plant.


No, it wasn't the Monarch caterpillar that I've been hoping might turn up, but it was the next best thing - a Queen caterpillar. As you can see, they are marked very similarly to the Monarchs, even as the butterflies themselves are, but the Queen caterpillar has three matched sets of fleshy tentacles protruding from the body.


You can see those tentacles - and their shadows - even more clearly in this shot of one of the caterpillars that had crawled off the milkweed and onto the nearby fence. Most likely looking for a likely resting spot for a chrysalis.

I'll keep hoping that one of my early morning walks around the garden will turn up Monarch larvae someday soon, but, in the meantime, these beautiful future Queens made my day.


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The Monarch migration continues. You can report your sightings, as I reported my first sighting of the fall last week, at Journey South. Be a part of this important Citizen Science project.