Don’t blame me, I did not come up with that phrase… it’s certainly a source for jokes around the lab, though.

Here is a batch of caterpillars and eggs I’m tending to.

Exciting stuff, isn’t it? (there actually isn’t any sarcasm in that phrase on my part, I thoroughly enjoy this work, but I realize it’s not for everyone!) Every day I get to clean out their frass (poop), give them new leaves, measure their head capsules, collect shed head capsules if I can, get photos of different instars, and maybe even put a few caterpillars in vials of alcohol. And of course taking notes the whole time. As much as it is important to keep digital records, I enjoy scribbling down notes and sketches on paper. It keeps my mind more organized, and I like having everything in one place I can just flip through, instead of trying to hunt down files on my computer. I was inspired by a talk given by Michael Canfield at Harvard a few weeks ago – all about the importance and history of field notes. He’s written a book called Field Notes on Science and Nature – I have not read it yet, but I intend to. So far my notebook isn’t very thrilling, but I do have a few cute caterpillar sketches in there.

As an aside, notice the jar by itself on the desk, with the lid partway off… that’s my A. lobeliae female! She laid some eggs! Unfortunately, I had left her sugar water soaked napkin in there, which made the vial very humid. Caterpillar eggs do not like humidity, so I’m not sure if they’ll end up being viable or not. So she’s getting aired out, and kept a while longer, perhaps she’ll lay more.

Acronicta afflicta in molting action.
(these photos are not of the same individual)

1st instar (note how it looks different from when it first hatched – it still has the same head size though!)

In progress… all the caterpillars which were molting were bright white, with almost no green coloration left at all.

And now for something completely diff…. uhh… second instar!

As an aside, their common name is the Afflicted Dagger Moth.
I wonder what they’re afflicted by?

I was wondering when my Acronicta americana caterpillars would gain their characteristic black tufts – and I got my answer. The 3rd instar!

Aren’t they getting adorable? Their hairs seem way too long proportional to their body size, but they’ll grow into them. You can see the two sets of black tufts in the first half of the body, and one black tuft near the end. They’re not terribly obvious yet, but definitely there as black setae instead of white.

I couldn’t get a picture, but they also have interesting black/white patterns on their head capsules. Maybe soon I can find a way to brush the hair out of their eyes enough to get a good photo. This pattern will be gone as they get older and end up with totally black shiny head capsules.

New thought – I wonder if these will turn out white or yellow? Do they start out the color they’ll end up? Or could they change? We shall seeeeeee…

I have an interesting and perhaps ambitious goal – to photograph caterpillars posing in the shapes of letters of the alphabet. I do not know, yet, whether I want to try to have a consistent background or if I want to go for bright colors and contrasts. I also do not know how possible it will be to successfully wrangle caterpillars into, say, the letter “M”. It is not something I am going to lose sleep over, but I might try posing caterpillars with a paintbrush while I’m photographing them for other purposes.

Since I am studying Acronicta, I will at least be able to get the letter “J” pretty consistently. It is their characteristic resting pose, like this A. rubricoma. I was trying to photograph it against a white background when I realized it made the setae nearly invisible – but on the red paper, wow did the fuzziness pop!

What do you think? Do you think I should try it? Do you think it would work as a poster, sort of like the ones you see with butterfly wing patterns?

I finally got an Acronita at my blacklight – a big female Acronicta lobeliae! As you can imagine I was SO EXCITED – I recognized the “dagger” markings characteristic of many Acronicta species right away.

Here she is in a container with a little bit of tissue soaked in sugar water. I watched her sip on the sugary mix, so she should survive for a little while. No eggs from her yet, hopefully will get some from her soon. I am raising some A. lobeliae caterpillars but only a few are thriving, so I’d really like to get some more from this girl.