Ceratomia catalpae Can Eat
Broken record time…
I swear to you that there is something new every time I hit the water.
Yesterday, it was a tree that was absolutely (well, almost absolutely) stripped of all of its leaves. A tree without any leaves isn’t exactly rare as there are plenty of standing dead trees without leaves along the Conestoga River, but this one had green branch-tips. I think it was the color in the branches that helped make this specimen stand out and I stopped for a while to figure out what was happening.
On a high branch there were still some leaves and I could see what appeared to be black worm-like objects. Caterpillars!
There was another leaf within reach on a lower branch and sure enough, there was a caterpillar present.
Turns out what I was looking at was the larval stage of a catalpa sphynx (Ceratomia catalpae) and as the name suggests it was on a catalpa tree, in this case a southern catalpa (Catalpa bignonioides).
Known for stripping catalpa trees bare, not only are these caterpillars valued by anglers as bait, but they are super cool looking. Unfortunately, this visual appeal does not translate to the adult stage as catalpa sphynx moths are smaller than what one would expect and are a drab brown.
According to Stephen Peele of the Florida Mycology Research Center, catalpa trees might be completely defoliated a couple of times during a season, but still survive and come back healthy. Crazy! “I have tried to understand the possible symbiotic relationship between the worm and the tree. There surely must be one,” writes Peele. (wikipedia)
Ahhh... science.
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