I’ve posted pictures of a Luna moth before here and here.

Tonight, upon getting home from work and walking down the sidewalk, what should there appear?

Why a rather large reddish caterpillar.

Turns out, he (or she) is a Luna moth caterpillar. Normally green in color, they turn brownish/reddish when ready to pupate.

Apparently, one of the types of leaves they eat are walnut leaves, which explains why all my most recent Luna Moth sightings of the past 8 years or so have been near a black walnut tree.

This is, I believe, the first time I’ve seen a Luna moth caterpillar. As a kid, I had Cecropia and Polyphemus moth caterpillars, but I don’t recall having a Luna moth caterpillar.

At any rate, I took some photos. Bummer that I can’t post them here.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 6th, 2010 at 10:05 pm and is filed under Nature. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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