Former Hopcat

There's a wild hop to the south of our field and another, much smaller one, to the north. Today is the first time that I've noticed that the northern one is male. When hops are cultivated only the females are grown. I found this chrysalis dangling like a dead leaf from the male bine. It has six silvery white spots on it and I guessed that it might be the pupa of a comma butterfly as they have a silvery white c-shaped mark on their wings.

I was very interested to read that comma caterpillars used to be found mainly on hops and were known as hopcats. Comma caterpillars feed primarily on stinging nettles these days.