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| A caterpillar curled up on the snow after I disturbed it |
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| The dark speck in the middle of the lower part of this photo is a Large Yellow Underwing caterpillar, honest! |
A Blog for moth recorders in Bucks, Berks and Oxon
Sunday, 10 December 2017
Snow cats in the Chilterns
Wasn't really expecting to see moths today, but did find caterpillars in numbers! I never knew Large Yellow Underwing caterpillars had a fondness for snow-top excursions, but it seems to be a known behaviour, at least in America. See this blog post for further details.
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Intriguing! In the back of my mind I seem to remember reading something in one of the journals a few years ago about Drinker Moth caterpillars liking to wander about in the snow, I think it was in one of the Baltic countries. I've never witnessed anything like that myself.
ReplyDeleteI wonder why thy do it? I thought they usually feed by night so it would be safer then to move over the snow to look for food? Surely they must be really easy targets for things like Robins?
ReplyDeleteYes, I thought they looked very vulnerable. There weren't many birds about at the time, possibly something to do with the presence of sledging teenagers :), and the caterpillars were on quite deep snow that I imagine would have gone over the head height of any Robins that tried to land in it. All the larvae I saw were right out in the open, I couldn't find any along the edges of the scrub. No idea what goes through the mind of a young Large Yellow Underwing!
ReplyDeleteFascinating, thanks so much. Isn't it the Large Yellow Underwing which also has some kind of jamming mechanism against bats? If so, it's altogether quite a star.
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