another beautiful caterpillar

...a dry and very mild day, but the sun never shone and the light was dreadful. On top of that, it was a very slow day amongst the hedgerow. Nonetheless, I found two new bugs, another new ichneumon, and this rather pretty caterpillar. I had to set the ISO to 400 to get any reasonable images today and, even then, I had to work with a very shallow depth of field. I had intended to take the monopod today but forgot!

This is the final instar caterpillar of the Drinker Moth, Euthrix potatoria and it will hibernate over winter in this form. The moth gets both its common and latin name from the caterpillars' supposed penchant for drinking drops of dew.

Tomorrow, I will try to remember my monopod...