Hey George, The ones on the redbud are red-humped caterpillars. See their red heads and the red hump a little further down on their body? I know they are fairly common in the south, but I've never seen them here before. Now I feel a sudden urge to run out and see if there's any of them on my redbud trees. They are the caterpillar of an unassuming dull brown moth that looks to me more like tree bark than anything else. I'll link a page below with info on them.

Red-humped Caterpillars

The second one looks like the puss asp I remember from my childhood. They are the larvae of the southern flannel moth. I remember their wicked sting as well as you do. I wouldn't touch one with a ten foot pole. The first instar of the caterpillar is not nearly as hairy as the later instars. The one in your photo is in the middle.....more hair or fur or whatever we want to call it than the earliest instars, but not as much hair/fur as the latest instars. I see a couple a year here, but not too many....and I carefully avoid making contact with them.

Puss Caterpillars and Moths

Hope this helps,

Dawn

Thanks Dawn. Last week I took a pair of pants off the line and wore them. Pretty soon I started to feel as if a tick was sticking me in the thigh. I looked and couldn't find anything. So I figured it was just my imagination. I got to working the garden. But the discomfort grew and grew until I couldn't stand it any more. I went inside and removed the pants, turning them inside out. I found a cocoon, I believe of this flannel moth. It had ruptured and formed a sore spot on my leg, larger than a silver dollar. It is only just now healing. These are very disagreeable critters!

Once, when we lived in Mexico, we had one fall into our washing machine with our clothes. We didn't know it. We dried the clothes and Sunday, we all got dressed and went to church. Well, within 30 minutes we all had to high tail it back home to bathe and change. The little hairs from that caterpillar were all through our clothing, affecting all of us!

You're welcome, George. I totally agree about the puss caterpillars. I pretty much run for the house when I see one. I used to step on them in our lawn when I was a kid running around barefoot and it was so painful that I've never forgotten it. They are incredibly disagreeable. I can't believe it formed such a sore on your leg, but reading your comments made me curious about how much damage a puss could do....and it is worse than I dreamed. Check out the linked page from the Merck Manual, and you'll see that it causes some people even more trouble than you described. I've always thought of pusses as toxic caterpillars, but didn't realize that were one of the most toxic cats in the USA.

Merck Manual: Puss Bites/Stings and side effects

I learn so much reading the posts in this group! Always interesting.

Carol

While they do have stinging hairs, this is actually the larvae of an American Dagger Moth. You can Google it, George, for images. Classic case of the caterpillar displaying more interesting color and form than the adult moth.

Susan

Just for fun, here's a picture one of my Ohio relatives posted on FB:

Apparently, it's a saddleback caterpillar (some kind of moth.)

Does that one sting? Between snakes and creepies, it is a wonder I even go outside!

It does. It has those urticating hairs or spines or whatever they are called that secrete a venom that can cause rash and nausea similar to the reaction George and I have had in the past from making contact with puss or asp caterpillars, or the one Susan identified as the Dagger Moth cat. I am more prone to see those kinds of cats (the ones that cause pain) in autumn when raking leaves. I don't know if they are more abundant then, or if I'm just noticing them more because I'm out raking up leaves. I make a point of not touching any sort of caterpillar that has hairs or spines because they often are venomous, and I don't know which ones are or aren't, so I just avoid touching them all. I think the saddlebacks are interesting to look at, but we have lots of other bizarre-looking caterpillars around here, and I avoid touching all of them. If I need to pick one up and move it, I use a stick or a trowel.