Green caterpillar with a horn. Pests of plants and crops on the site - caterpillars: photo with names, mechanical and biological methods of control. Clothes or room moth
Sometimes on dill we meet a large green caterpillar with bright black stripes and orange spots. Previously, I ruthlessly crushed them. But recently I found out that this is a caterpillar of a swallowtail butterfly. And killing them immediately became a pity.
Swallowtail is listed in the Red Book of many countries
Why machaon - machaon?
We got used to the idea that the brightest and most unusual animals live somewhere in distant lands. Our swallowtail, which belongs to the family of sailboats, is not inferior to many “Tropicans” by the brightness of the pattern and the sophistication of forms, but it has become less and less common. About 80 years ago, the caterpillars of these butterflies were considered malicious pests. cultivated plants Therefore, they waged a merciless struggle with him. Therefore, the number of swallowtails has declined sharply and today they are listed in the Red Book, and not only in our country, but also in many European countries.
The swallowtail got its name from the famous Swedish systematizer Carl Linnaeus. He named the butterfly in honor of the outstanding surgeon of antiquity, who participated in the Greek campaign against Troy. It is borrowed from ancient Greek mythology: Machaon was the name of one of the two sons of the Thessalian king and physician Asclepius (Esculapius, later the god of healing). This name is found in Ovid, Virgil, ancient authors wrote about the "swallowtail craft", "swallowtail potion".
Butterfly
From our diurnal butterflies machaon is the largest. Its wingspan sometimes reaches ten centimeters. It feeds on the nectar of flowers. This butterfly is in flight all the time. Even when she sits on a flower, she continues to flap her wings. mating games bright swallowtails resemble intricate dances in flight.
After courtship, the female lays eggs on a fodder plant: on a stem or leaf. In total, one female is able to lay about 120 eggs during the breeding season. For my short life(only 20 days) the butterfly lays eggs twice.
The caterpillar feeds mainly on flowers and seeds of plants, less often on leaves.
Caterpillar
After 7 days, a swallowtail caterpillar hatches from the egg - it is very bright and very voracious, it can eat a bed of dill in a day.
The bright colors give it a formidable look. When irritated or threatened, the caterpillar extends orange "horns" called osmetria, releasing an orange-yellow liquid with a pungent bad smell. Only young and middle-aged caterpillars protect themselves in this way; adult caterpillars do not put forward their iron in case of danger.
The caterpillar of the swallowtail clings quite tightly to the stems and does not fall, even if the stem is cut off and taken to another place.
It does not climb trees, does not eat up roots. Forage plants are various umbrella plants, in particular - hogweed, carrots, dill, parsley, fennel, celery, cumin. Can eat Amur velvet or alder. It prefers to eat flowers and ovaries, less often leaves of plants. By the end of its development, the caterpillar hardly feeds.
When irritated or threatened, the caterpillar puts out orange "horns".
chrysalis
Pupation occurs on the stems of host plants or on neighboring plants. The color of the pupa depends on the season - summer pupae are green or yellowish, covered with small black dots. Wintering brown in color, with a black head end and thick horns on the head.
So is it a pest or not?
Now it is difficult to say how tangible the damage caused by the swallowtail to cultivated plants. Plowing land, grazing, mowing, using pesticides - all this is real for the swallowtail and many other insects. ecological catastrophy. And now you can rarely meet this caterpillar in our beds. Kill it or give it the opportunity to develop into a beautiful butterfly - it's up to you.
Today, scientists different countries make attempts to artificially breed rare, endangered swallowtails, then to release them into nature. British experts tried to restore the population of the swallowtail, which disappeared in one of the swampy areas of Cambridgeshire due to land drainage in the 1950s. Eggs laid by butterflies in the laboratory were transferred here, having previously planted about 2 thousand bushes of the fodder plant of bitterwort. The experiment, alas, was unsuccessful.
However, in the same place, in the UK, thanks to the experiments of the biologist K. Clarke in the laboratory, it was possible to deduce a large number of adult butterflies for 1-2 seasons. This gives hope that our children and grandchildren will still be able to admire the aerial dances of the beautiful swallowtail.
Caterpillars are crawling, worm-like insect larvae. They come in completely different sizes and colors, can be naked or covered with fluffy hairs. One thing unites them - all of them someday turn into beautiful butterflies. However, the appearance of caterpillars can also surprise and impress. Description and name of caterpillar species can be found in this article.
What are they?
Unlike worms, with which they are constantly compared, caterpillars are not independent group animals. These are insect larvae - one of the forms of development of Lepidoptera, or butterflies. This stage occurs after the "egg" stage and can last from a couple of weeks to several years. Then she becomes a chrysalis and only then an adult.
The body of all types of caterpillars consists of a head, 3 thoracic and 10 abdominal segments. The eyes are on the side of the head. They have many limbs. In the region of the thoracic segments there are three pairs of legs, on the belly there are about five.
Caterpillars are rarely completely naked. Their body is covered with single or very dense hairs arranged in bundles. Many species of caterpillars have raised cuticle outgrowths that form denticles, granules, and spines.
From the moment they hatch from the egg, the caterpillar begins to change. Often individuals of larvae of the same species, but different ages, differ externally. As they grow, they molt from two (miner caterpillar) to forty (cloth moth) times.
Butterfly larvae have a special saliva. When exposed to air, it hardens to form silk. People have not disregarded this ability and have been breeding caterpillars for more than a century to obtain valuable fibers. Predatory species are also used in pest control in vegetable gardens, but herbivores can cause damage to the farm.
Types of caterpillars and butterflies
Lepidoptera insects are distributed throughout the planet, but only in those places where there is flowering vegetation. They are rarely found in the cold polar regions, lifeless deserts and bald highlands. Not too many of them temperate latitudes, but the tropics have the greatest diversity of species.
But how to determine the type of caterpillars? First of all, attention should be paid to color, size, number of legs, length of hairs and other features specific to each species. Caterpillars grow in length from a few millimeters to 12 centimeters. Their coloration often does not resemble the color of the butterfly they turn into, therefore, experience and relevant knowledge are needed to recognize them. For example, the larva of a large harpy is light green, and the adult is grayish-brown, the larvae of yellow lemongrass are bright green.
To understand what kind of caterpillar is in front of you, observing its nutrition will help. Many of them (cabbage, bear, swallowtail, polyxena) are phytophages and eat flowers, leaves and fruits of plants. Woodworms, castnias, glass-boxes feed exclusively on wood and grass roots. Real moths and some types of bagworms eat fungi and lichens. Some caterpillars prefer wool, hair, horny substances, wax (carpet and clothes moths, moths), and predators are rare, such as scoops, pigeons, and moths.
Caterpillars in Russia
Our regions are not as rich in insects as hot tropical belts. But even in Russia there will be several hundred species of caterpillars. Fatheads, pigeons, nymphalids, whites, sailboats, rhyodinids and other orders are common here.
A typical representative of whites is cabbage. She lives all over Eastern Europe, eastern Japan and North Africa. Butterflies of this species are white, with black wings at the tips and two black dots. Their caterpillars are yellow-green with black warts all over their bodies. These are well-known pests that feed on cabbages and cabbage leaves, horseradish, swede.
The alkynoy sailboat lives mainly in Japan, Korea and China. In Russia, caterpillars of the species are found only in Primorsky Krai, and then in its southern part. They live near rivers and lakes where aristolochia grows. Butterflies lay their eggs on this plant, and the caterpillars then feed on their leaves. Alcinous caterpillars are brown with white segments in the middle, the body is covered with teeth. Both adult and larval forms of insects are poisonous, so no one is in a hurry to hunt them.
Brazhnik is one of the most known species. Blind hawks are a rare species. Their butterflies are dark brown in color, and the larvae are light green with red spiracles and white stripes on the sides. Caterpillars appear in July, they have a black horn on the back of the body at the end. They feed on the leaves of willows, poplars and birches and pupate in August.
poisonous species
Caterpillars often serve as food for other animals. In order not to become someone's food, they have many adaptations. Some species use a protective or repellent color, while others secrete a secret with an unpleasant odor. Some of them adopted poison.
Scales, hairs and needles hidden under the skin of some caterpillars can cause lepidopterism or caterpillar dermatitis. It is manifested by inflammation, swelling, itching and redness of the contact points and can have serious consequences. Poisonous are the larvae of oak, unpaired and walking silkworm, megalopygi operakulus, hickory bear, Saturnia io, godwort bear, etc.
One of the most dangerous is the Lonomia caterpillar. It is found only in South America. Poisoning her secret even has its own name - lonomiasis. Contact with lonomia obliqua and lonomia achelous can result in severe internal bleeding and lethal outcome. Caterpillars live on fruit trees, and plantation workers often become their “victims”.
Peacock-eye atlas
These butterflies are considered one of the largest in the world. Their wingspan reaches about 25 centimeters. They are common in India, China, countries and islands South-East Asia. Their caterpillars are thick and grow up to twelve centimeters long. Bluish-green in the early stages, they become pure white with age. The body is covered with thick hairy needles, from small hairs on them it seems that the caterpillars are covered with dust or snow. They exude a strong fagara silk, and their torn cocoons are sometimes used as purses or cases.
Lilac hawk
A large number of caterpillar species are green. They feed on plants, and this coloration helps to disguise themselves as environment. Caterpillars of privet or lilac hawk hawk dyed in light green. On the sides they have short diagonal stripes of white and black, and next to them there is one red dot.
Hawk hawk larvae are thick and reach a length of 9-10 centimeters. A white and black outgrowth resembling a horn sticks out in the back of the back of the caterpillars. They live in Western Europe, China, Japan, the European part of Russia and in the south Far East, in the Caucasus, southern Siberia and d Kazakhstan. They feed on jasmine, barberry, elderberry, viburnum, currant. They become caterpillars from July to September, and then winter twice as pupae.
Apollo Parnassus
Black species of caterpillars in nature are not very common. This color boasts a peacock eye, grass cocoon, Parnassian Apollo. The last species is named after Greek god Arts, Apollo. These butterflies live in Europe and Asia, are found in Southern Siberia, Chuvashia, Mordovia, Moscow region. They love dry and sunny valleys located at an altitude of 2000-3000 thousand meters.
Adult caterpillars of the Parnassian Apollo are painted deep black with bright red dots and blue warts on the sides. Behind the head of the larva is an osmetrium - a gland in the form of small horns. Usually it is hidden under the skin and protrudes at the moment of danger, releasing a substance with an unpleasant odor. Caterpillars feed on sedum and juveniles and appear only in good sunny weather.
Clothes or room moth
This type of caterpillar gives a lot of trouble in the house. They eat cereals, flour, silk and woolen fabrics, furniture upholstery. Adult individuals - butterflies - are harmful only because they can lay eggs. It is caterpillars that cause all the main damage to things, devouring everything they find.
Their bodies are almost transparent and covered with thin beige-brown skin. Among the caterpillars, they are considered the smallest, the size of the larvae varies from a millimeter to one centimeter. In the larval stage, they stay from a month to two and a half years, during which time they manage to shed up to 40 times. Moths live in the USA, Australia, Europe, Southeast Asia, New Zealand, Zimbabwe and many other regions.
Akraga koa, or "marmalade" caterpillar
Amazing caterpillars of this species look like something extraterrestrial. Their transparent-silver body seems to be made of jelly. Due to which they are called "marmalade" or "crystal". Their body is covered with cone-shaped processes, on the tips of which there are orange dots. Caterpillars reach only three centimeters in length. They are sticky to the touch, and the substances that secrete their glands are saturated with poison.
The insect lives in the Neotropics - a region covering the South and part Central America. You can meet him in Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica, etc. The caterpillar feeds on the leaves of mango trees, coffee and other plants.
Swallowtail
Swallowtail is another insect named after the hero of mythology. This time it is an ancient Greek doctor. About 40 subspecies of swallowtails are known. All of them are very colorful both at the adult stage and during the development of larvae. They are distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere. Found in North Africa North America throughout Europe except Ireland. In mountainous areas, they can rise to heights from 2 to 4.5 kilometers.
Swallowtail caterpillars are born twice a season: in May and August, but they are in the state of larvae for only a month. As they grow up appearance changes a lot. At first they are black with red dots and a white spot on the back. Over time, the color becomes light green, and black stripes and red dots are placed on each segment, White color present only on the limbs. They also have hidden bright orange osmetrium.
Sometimes in the summer on the meadow paths, or even in the city, you can meet slowly crawling large caterpillars. Someone will say “fu, what a disgusting thing!”, And someone, on the contrary, will pick it up with interest. The caterpillar, of course, does not like this, it begins to wriggle and curl up into a ring, because it has eaten for several weeks and is now looking for a secluded place to pupate. The caterpillar shown in the photo wine hawk hawk (lat. Deilephila elpenor) light brown, with a greenish tint; on the sides of the front of the body, not far from the head, it has dark spots with a white border on top and a small horn on the tail. If the caterpillar is frightened, it retracts its head, inflates segments with a pattern of eyes, which makes them look like a snake's head with eyes, which should scare away uninvited predators. This caterpillar feeds on fireweed, better known to us as Ivan-tea, bedstraw and grape leaves (for which it got its name). After pupation, on next year from it will hatch a wine hawk moth, a rather large twilight moth, which, in terms of flight and feeding, is very similar to a hummingbird. Even in English it is called elephant hawk moth, which can be roughly translated as "elephant moth".
Wine hawk(lat. Deilephila elpenor) - a butterfly from the family hawks (Sphingidae). Wingspan 50-70 mm. The color of the front wings and body is olive-pink with transverse oblique pink bands on the front wings. The hindwings are black at the base. Widely distributed in the Palaearctic. Flight time - from mid-May to mid-August, one, in some places - two generations. Caterpillar stage - from mid-June to August. The color of the caterpillar varies from light green to brown and almost black, on the 4th and 5th rings there are "eyes" with a dark core and a white border. The horn is short, black-brown. Forage plants of caterpillars are fireweed (Epilobium angustifolium and E. hirsutum) and fireweed (Chamerion); less often bedstraw, touchy, grapes. Pupation on soil, pupa hibernates.
Below is a photo (not mine) of what an imago (adult moth) looks like:
Photo by jean pierre Hamon, Wikipedia
The wine hawk belongs to the genus Deilephila. These are large and medium butterflies with a wingspan of 40-80 mm. The wine hawk moth is an olive butterfly with a pink pattern. The base of the hind wings is black. Wingspan 50-70 mm. The head, thorax and abdomen of a moth are olive green. Pinkish stripes on the back near the abdomen merge into one longitudinal line. Antennae thickened, grayish-pink. The eyes are large, complex, covered with scales. Insects have excellent eyesight, they see objects in low light. Insects are common in Europe, including the south of the Urals. Found in Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, India, Korea, Japan and China. It lives in gardens, on the edge of the forest, roadsides. Settles on honeysuckle bushes, flowers of petunias, iris. Moths living in gardens and parks pollinate 5-10% of the nearest trees and shrubs.
The caterpillar of the wine hawk hawk may be green or dark brown, almost black in color. On the 4th-5th segment of the body there are round black eyes with a white border. The tail horn is short, black at the base, the tip is white. because of large sizes 70-80 mm caterpillars make a frightening impression on people. In fact, they are not dangerous. Even plants, the larvae do not cause serious harm.
The caterpillar of the wine hawk moth, in case of danger, is able to inflate a segment of the body with eyes. She pulls her head inward, assumes the pose of a sphinx, lifting her front legs off the surface. It makes her look like a snake. Given the impressive size of the body, enemies such as birds prefer not to fight.
Butterfly summer time is from May to August. They are active in the evening until midnight. Moths feed on flowers and mate. Depending on the region of habitat, they give from one to five generations. For plants that open buds at close times, they are excellent pollinators. AT mating season they often fly towards light sources.
hawks excellent fliers, during migration they cover thousands of kilometers. Butterflies are able to hover in one place, feeding on the nectar of flowers, move vertically up and down.
The fertilized female lays single or paired round eggs on the leaves and stems of fodder plants. Green masonry with a glossy surface. The embryo develops in 7-10 days. Young larvae are yellow or light green in color. As they mature, most become grey-brown with black streaks. This stage lasts about a month.
The caterpillar of the wine hawk moth can be beneficial and harmful. It depends on her diet. The larva that settled on the weeds helps to get rid of the grass without weeding. Insect does no harm agriculture. The fodder plants of hawkweed are flowers and ovary of fireweed (willow-herb), bedstraw, and touchy. In rare cases, it feeds on grape leaves.
Having reached the fifth instar, the larva descends to the ground and prepares for pupation. She chooses a place at the foot of the plant on which she ate, and forms a cocoon. The pupa is brown, 40-45 mm long. They hibernate in the litter or upper layers of the soil.
Hawk moths fly at speeds up to 50 km/h. The wind interferes with them in flight and while feeding on flowers. With a wind strength of 3 m/s, insects do not fly out to feed.
The medium wine hawk is listed in the Red Book of Karelia and Belgorod region like a rare species.
The wine hawk moth received the Latin name Deilephila elpenor in honor of the hero of mythology: Elpenor is a friend of Odysseus, returning with him from Troy; died falling from the roof of the palace of the sorceress Circe.
There is an assumption that these spots on the caterpillars of wine hawks imitate the "glasses" of a cobra. However, it is unlikely that birds can confuse a small caterpillar with a snake, especially since wine hawks are widespread even where cobras are not found. A simple experience has shown that birds are very willing to eat ocellar caterpillars. There is no definite answer to the question about the reason for this coloration. The horn of the caterpillar of the middle wine hawk is weakly expressed.
The hawk family (Sphingidae) is one of the most fast flyers not only among butterflies, but among insects in general. Some develop speeds up to 60 km / h! Narrow and long front wings, streamlined, aerodynamic body make their flight swift and maneuverable. It was they, like some birds, who became the prototype for the creation of jet aircraft, thanks to observant designers. Hawk hawks make 37 to 85 wing beats per second, while the swallowtail, for example, makes only 5-6 beats.
The wine hawk moth can be brought out of the chrysalis at home on its own, but for this, after pupation, it must be stored in the refrigerator for some time, otherwise the adult insect will hatch somewhere around the new year, when it will have nothing to eat. detailed information about their breeding