A couple of nights ago I was sitting in my yard under a patio umbrella during a heavy rain reading on my phone when I noticed a small (less than one inch) caterpillar on one of my fingers. I carefully peeled it off (it was clinging like velcro) and put it on the table in front of me and attempted to record some decent video of it with my camera in torch mode. It wasn’t until I let the caterpillar go that I reviewed the bittage and saw that it had some weird markings on the front that might be face-mimicing, but the video wasn’t detailed enough to get a good look at it. I want to see some better photos of the species, but so far my googling has been fruitless. Any help?
Video link.
It has a very big “ face” for a catterpillar…
It has a very loud “ROAR” for a caterpillar less than one inch long!
But where are you located?
South Carolina.
Looks like a type of tent caterpillar.
First eliminate the sawflies - it’s really hard to tell from that video, how many prolegs ( fatter “legs” after the first 3 real pairs) does it have?
I can’t tell either, from the video. And that’s all the observation that I have (other than a few more seconds of similar video.) This was taken around midnight and the LED on the phone was the only light.
Identification could be achieved by setting the caterpillar up and allowing it to complete its life cycle.
Next time, try and get the bottom/legs in full view.
If it’s as small as you say, it could be an early instar of something more familiar, but that makes it harder to search for, as most caterpillar ID pics focus on the later, bigger, instars.
Steve…?