Cinnabar Caterpillar

These dramatically coloured stripy caterpillars are the same species as the red and black moth I blipped just a week ago!


The female lays up to 300 eggs in clusters of 30-60 and the larvae start off a pale yellow colour before developing into these little tigers :-) about 3cm long. The ragwort that my friend and I found these munching voraciously, was also covered in reddish beetles which I haven't identified yet. They were climbing on the caterpillars and their presence was seeming to be causing them to move, whilst stationary, in a very jerky way, throwing their heads around??? If anyone has any idea what was going on I'd love to hear your thoughts. One is slightly visible under the caterpillar on the left.


This photography is certainly making me look much more closely at plants and little creatures that surround us ;-) it's great!!!



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