Caterpillar frass...

tj

I don’t really think so. I have a lot of that around. I thought the light colored piles might be poop.

Not random enough for frass. My guess would be planthopper hatchlings and egg debris.

Ineresting, thanks, rhizo.

Hey, Iris....what's the plant that these are on? These teensy wasps parasitize certain caterpillars.

Thank you, Rhizo. This is really interesting. They are on the same Oak the Datana caterpillars you identified for me were. They are gone by now though. And far as I can tell they looked very big and healthy.

I probably don’t want to know how many different kinds of wasps are after the poor caterpillars. I found this dead tussock moth caterpillar with the wasp cocoon not long ago. At least this was easy to figure out.

Iris, what is that brown and white thing?

Is it an ichneumonid cocoon? save it until the wasp emerges and take a picture! They are the prettiest darn things.

I don't think that I've ever seen one in person, how amazing is that?

I am sorry, I didn’t get any notifications. The pictures I found when I tried to figure out what it was looked almost identical to mine. And yes Fori, this is what I think it is.

I remembered to walk by there today.

Aww you let her get away without being photographed!!

So it goes. I was very lucky this Summer to see the Polyphemus moth as an adult after watching it grow from a caterpillar in my Oak. Probably only because she had already attracted a male and they were hanging there the whole day, but still. Never had seen one in real life before.