Butterflies got their name “bear” from the appearance of their caterpillars, whose bodies are covered with dark, long hairs. These caterpillars really resemble small bear cubs in appearance.
Dipper butterflies are perfectly protected from enemies: their blood is poisonous and bitter, and in addition, the bear has a frightening coloring. Caterpillars are also well protected; in addition to poisonous blood, they have poisonous hairs that provoke a severe allergic reaction in people.
Ursa butterflies come in medium to large sizes. As a rule, they are variegated and brightly colored. Their front wings are triangular in shape, wide and elongated. The wings are decorated with a pattern of stripes, lines and spots. The hind wings are not so variegated, yellow, red and pink. When the bear is in calm state, the wings fold into a house.
Their body is thick and completely covered with hairs. The legs are hairy and short. The antennae are comb-like.
Lifestyle of a bear
Bears live all over the world. There are about 11 thousand species of these butterflies. About 60 species live in the European part of our country.
Mostly these butterflies are nocturnal or crepuscular, but certain species fly during the day, for example, the plantain bear. Oral apparatus these butterflies are not developed, so they do not feed throughout their lives.
Bear caterpillars are polyphagous; they eat many shrubs and herbaceous plants, and they also damage numerous trees.
Before pupating, the caterpillar weaves a silky, loose cocoon. She braids the falling hairs into the walls of the cocoon. Inside the cocoon, the bear's pupae are motionless.
Lady Bear
One of the notable representatives of the family in middle lane is the lady bear. The wingspan of the butterfly reaches 55 millimeters. The hind wings of the lady bear are yellow or bright red.
These butterflies live in shady damp places. They meet from June to July. Their habitats are ravines, rivers, forest clearings. Caterpillars eat leaves of bushes and herbaceous plants eg willow, blackberry and raspberry. The caterpillars spend the winter in the soil and pupate in the spring.
Kaya bear
Another widespread group of bears is the Kaya bear. These butterflies are very beautiful, and they are one of the largest in Russia, their wingspan reaches 80 millimeters.
The female bear kaya has coffee-brown forewings with white bands. The red hind wings have large black peas with a blue tint.
Kaya bears are found in late summer. The caterpillars are black and hairy. They appear in the fall and spend the winter. These caterpillars have a very thick covering of hairs, thanks to which they resemble furry animals. In times of danger, the caterpillar takes a protective position: it curls into a ring, thus protecting all its vital important organs, and the body is reliably protected from enemies by thick poisonous hairs. When the caterpillars pupate, they hide under fallen trunks and stones and weave their cocoons there.
Hebe the Bear
The she-bear Hebe lives in the steppe zone of our country. The wingspan of this butterfly reaches 55 millimeters. Their forewings are light, have black spots at the outer edge, and in the center there are 3 narrow black bands. The hind wings are reddish with black spots. These are night butterflies. They fly from May to July.
Sometimes on dill we see a large green caterpillar with bright black stripes and orange spots. I used to crush them mercilessly. But just recently I learned that this is the caterpillar of the swallowtail butterfly. And it immediately became a pity to kill them.
Swallowtail is listed in the Red Book of many countries
Why is a swallowtail a swallowtail?
We have become accustomed 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” in its brightness of pattern and refinement of form, but it has become less and less common. About 80 years ago, the caterpillars of these butterflies were considered malicious pests cultivated plants, so they fought him mercilessly. Therefore, the number of swallowtails has sharply decreased and today they are listed in the Red Book, not only in our country, but also in many European countries.
The swallowtail received 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 (Aesculapius, later the god of healing). This name is found in Ovid, Virgil, ancient authors wrote about the “swallowtail craft”, “swallowtail medicine”.
Butterfly
From our day butterflies Swallowtail is the largest. Its wingspan sometimes reaches ten centimeters. It feeds on the nectar of flowers. This butterfly is always in flight. Even when she sits on a flower, she continues to flap her wings. The mating games of colorful swallowtails resemble intricate dances in flight.
After courtship, the female lays eggs on a food plant: on a stem or leaf. In total, during the breeding season, one female is capable of laying about 120 eggs. 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, the swallowtail caterpillar hatches from the egg - very bright and very voracious, it can eat a bed of dill in a day.
The bright colors give it a menacing look. When irritated or threatened, the caterpillar puts out orange “horns” called osmetria, secreting an orange-yellow liquid with a caustic unpleasant smell. Only young and middle-aged caterpillars protect themselves in this way; adult caterpillars do not move their glands when in danger.
The swallowtail caterpillar clings quite tightly to the stems and does not fall, even if the stem is cut off and taken to another place.
She does not climb trees and does not eat roots. Forage plants include various umbelliferous plants, in particular hogweed, carrots, dill, parsley, fennel, celery, and caraway seeds. Can feast on Amur velvet or alder. Prefers to feed on flowers and ovaries, less often on plant leaves. By the end of its development, the caterpillar hardly eats.
When irritated or threatened, the caterpillar puts out orange “horns.”
Doll
Pupation occurs on the stems of the host plant or on neighboring plants. The color of the pupae depends on the season - summer pupae are green or yellowish, covered with small black dots. Overwintering ones are 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 significant the damage caused by the swallowtail to cultivated plants is. Plowing land, grazing, mowing, using pesticides - all this is real for the swallowtail and many other insects. ecological catastrophy. And it is now rare to see this caterpillar in our garden beds. Kill it or give it the opportunity to develop into a beautiful butterfly - it's up to you.
Today scientists different countries They are trying to artificially breed rare, endangered swallowtails, and then release them into the wild. English experts tried to restore the population of the swallowtail, which disappeared in one of the wetlands of Cambridgeshire due to land drainage in the 1950s. The eggs laid by the butterflies in the laboratory were transferred here, having previously planted about 2 thousand bushes of the host plant bittergrass. The experiment, alas, was unsuccessful.
However, there, in Great Britain, thanks to the experiments of the biologist K. Clarke, it was possible to develop a large number of adult butterflies for 1-2 seasons. This gives us hope that our children and grandchildren will still be able to admire the aerial dances of the beautiful swallowtail.
Butterfly larvae - caterpillars - come in a variety of shapes and colors. And anyone who does not have an aversion to caterpillars can enjoy watching these amazing creatures and perhaps learn something new for yourself. This is especially true for pupation, because it is one thing to simply know about the life cycle of insects, and another to see with your own eyes the process of transformation of one creature into another.
Hawk Moths
Hawk Moths (Sphingidae) - a family of large or medium-sized butterflies. The body is powerful, often cone-shaped; wings are narrow, elongated, with a span from 30 to 175 mm.
For some unknown reason, with my aunt's submission most life called hawk moths bob A mi. What the bobs such - it’s incomprehensible, I’ve never heard this word from anyone’s lips except my aunt, and Yandex finds only Dostoevsky’s story of the same name for such a request.
The caterpillars are large, beautiful, usually brightly colored with contrasting stripes and false eyes. The tail has a characteristic horn.
The pupae of most hawk moths also have a horn.
Next we will talk about the history of pupation of two caterpillars found simultaneously on our site and identified as larvae hawk moths: wine And fake. Actually, identifying them was not particularly difficult, since it is known that hawkmoth caterpillars are very picky and selective of their food plants, therefore, if a caterpillar is found on grapes, then it can be said with a high probability that it should turn out to be a wine hawkmoth.
So, the first story is happy...
Wine Hawkmoth (Deilephila elpenor)
The caterpillar was found eating grape leaves. She was fat, elastic and green, with a horn and four false eyes in the front.
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She behaved actively and did not refuse food in captivity. I also didn’t mind being photographed in different poses. Click on the pictures - they have a lot of details!
But a couple of days later, she disappeared from sight. Carefully turning over the leaves piled on the bottom of the aquarium, I discovered a certain conglomerate: the leaves were clearly glued together. In the depths of the shelter, the strangely modified body of a caterpillar, covered with mucus, lay motionless.
After a day or two, I decided to see what happened in the house of leaves. As soon as I started raking them, I felt something twitch energetically inside. The leaves were glued together perfectly, but what can one poor caterpillar oppose destructive power human mind?
I don’t think it will be a revelation to anyone that the leaves were hiding doll.
The front part of the pupa is completely rigid, the rear part consists of three movably connected segments and ends with a horn. When a doll is nervous, it can beat intensely, frightening the offender and jumping from place to place:
Here's what struck me most. Next to the pupa in the leaves lay a blackened and dried head and the front part of the body. former caterpillar with six horny legs. I never thought about the fact that when turning into a chrysalis, the caterpillar discards head!(“And what does she think with???” - this begs an idiotic question, from which, however, another follows: “Do caterpillars think in principle?”)
The idea for the demotivator is born by itself: “Don’t be a larva! Don't lose your head!
Now all that remains is to put the pupa in a secluded, cool place, and perhaps in the spring I will be able to watch the most exciting stage of the transformation: the birth of a butterfly.
Added six months later: It was possible to observe the birth of a butterfly, although a little earlier than expected. For details and photos, click on the picture:
The medium wine hawk moth is the one that hatched in me six months later.
And now the second story, tragic...
Linden hawk moth (Mimas tiliae)
This caterpillar was caught on a linden tree, and when caught it was approximately the same green color as our previous hero. However, by the time of the photo shoot, she had noticeably changed her color to green-yellow. If I had read about this caterpillar earlier, I would have realized that it was already about to pupate - in the linden hawkmoth this is preceded by a change in color.
If I had immediately planted the caterpillar in the leaves and not touched it again, then perhaps I would now still have a pupa of the linden hawk moth. But I did not allow the poor creature to calmly carry out its biological program. While I was replanting, while I was taking photographs...
Caterpillars are crawling, worm-like insect larvae. They are absolutely different sizes and flowers, can be bare or covered with fluffy hairs. They have one thing in common - they all someday turn into beautiful butterflies. However, the appearance of the caterpillars can also surprise and impress. You will find a description and name of the caterpillar species in this article.
What are they?
Unlike worms, with which they are constantly compared, caterpillars are not an independent group of 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 it becomes a pupa 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 located on the sides of the head. They have many limbs. In the area 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 bunches. Many species of caterpillars have raised cuticle outgrowths that form denticles, granules and spines.
From the moment the caterpillar hatches from the egg, it begins to change. Often individuals of larvae of the same species, but of different ages, differ in appearance. As they grow, they molt from two (miner caterpillar) to forty (clothes moth) times.
Butterfly larvae have a special saliva. When exposed to air, it hardens to form silk. People have not ignored this ability and have been breeding caterpillars for centuries to obtain valuable fibers. Predatory species They are also used to control pests in gardens, but herbivores can cause damage to the farm.
Types of caterpillars and butterflies
Lepidoptera insects are distributed throughout the planet, but only in places where there is flowering vegetation. They are rarely found in cold polar regions, lifeless deserts and bald highlands. There are not too many of them in temperate latitudes, but greatest variety species are found in the tropics.
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 from a few millimeters to 12 centimeters in length. Their coloration is often not similar to that of the butterfly they transform into, so recognizing them requires experience and knowledge. For example, the larva of the great harpy is light green, and the adult is grayish-brown; the larvae of the yellow lemongrass are bright green.
Observing its diet will help you understand what type of caterpillar is in front of you. Many of them (cabbage, bear, swallowtail, polyxena) are phytophages and eat flowers, leaves and fruits of plants. Wood borers, castnias, and glass beetles feed exclusively on wood and grass roots. True moths and some species of bagworms consume mushrooms and lichens. Some caterpillars prefer wool, hair, horny substances, wax (carpet and clothes moths, moths), and predators, such as cutworms, bluegills, and moths, are also rare.
Caterpillars in Russia
Our regions are not as rich in insects as hot regions tropical zones. But even in Russia there are several hundred species of caterpillars. The common species here are fatheads, bluegills, nymphalids, whitefishes, swallowtails, riodinids and other orders.
A typical representative of whites is cabbage grass. She lives all over Eastern Europe, eastern Japan and North Africa. Butterflies of this species are white, with black wing 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 heads and leaves of cabbage, horseradish, and rutabaga.
The alkin's swallowtail lives mainly in Japan, Korea and China. In Russia, caterpillars of the species are found only in the Primorsky Territory, and then in its southern part. They live near rivers and lakes where Aristolochia grows. Butterflies lay eggs on this plant, and caterpillars then feed on its leaves. Alkinoe caterpillars are brown with white segments in the middle, the body is covered with teeth. Both the adult and larval forms of insects are poisonous, so no one is in a hurry to hunt them.
Hawkmoth is one of the most known species. Blind Hawkmoths are rare species. Their butterflies are dark brown in color, and their larvae are light green with red spiracles and white stripes on the sides. The caterpillars appear in July; on the back of their body they have a black horn at the end. They feed on the leaves of willows, poplars and birches and pupate already in August.
Poisonous species
Caterpillars often serve as food for other animals. To avoid becoming someone's food, they have many adaptations. Some species use protective or deterrent coloration, while others secrete a secretion with an unpleasant odor. Some of them used 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. The larvae of the oak, gypsy and marching silkworms, megalopygis operaculus, hickory dipper, Saturnia io, spiderwort, etc. are poisonous.
The lonomia caterpillar is considered one of the most dangerous. It occurs only in South America. Poisoning with its secretion even has its own name - lonomyasis. Contact with lonomia obliqua and lonomia achelous species may result in severe internal bleeding And fatal. Caterpillars live on fruit trees, and their “victims” are often plantation workers.
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 in length. Bluish-green in the early stages, they become snow-white over time. The body is covered with thick, hairy needles; small hairs on them give the impression that the caterpillars are covered with dust or snow. They secrete durable fagar silk, and their torn cocoons are sometimes used as wallets or cases.
Hawkmoth lilac
A large number of caterpillar species are green. They feed on plants, and this color helps them camouflage themselves as environment. Caterpillars of privet or lilac hawkmoth painted in light green color. On their sides there are short diagonal stripes of white and black, and next to them there is one red dot.
Hawkmoth larvae are thick and reach a length of 9-10 centimeters. A white and black outgrowth resembling a horn protrudes from the back of the caterpillars' back. They live in Western Europe, China, Japan, European Russia and the south Far East, in the Caucasus, southern Siberia and Kazakhstan. They feed on jasmine, barberry, elderberry, viburnum, and currants. They become caterpillars from July to September, and then overwinter twice as pupae.
Apollo of Parnassus
Black species of caterpillars are not very common in nature. The peacock's eye, the grass cocoon moth, and Apollo Parnassus can boast of this color. Last view named after greek god arts, Apollo. These butterflies live in Europe and Asia, found in Southern Siberia, Chuvashia, Mordovia, Moscow region. They love dry and sunny valleys located at an altitude of 2000-3000 thousand meters.
Adult Apollo parnassian caterpillars are deep black with bright red dots and blue warts on the sides. Behind the head of the larva there is an osmetium - a gland in the form small horns. It is usually hidden under the skin and protrudes at the moment of danger, releasing a substance with an unpleasant odor. The caterpillars feed on sedum and juveniles and appear only in good sunny weather.
Clothes or house moth
This type of caterpillar causes a lot of trouble in the house. They eat cereals, flour, silk and wool fabrics, and furniture upholstery. Adults - butterflies - are harmful only because they can lay eggs. All the main damage to things is caused by the caterpillars, which devour everything they find.
Their bodies are almost transparent and covered with thin beige-brown skin. Among caterpillars, they are considered the smallest, the size of the larvae varies from a millimeter to one centimeter. They remain in the larval stage from a month to two and a half years, during which time they manage to molt up to 40 times. Moths live in the USA, Australia, Europe, Southeast Asia, New Zealand, Zimbabwe and many other regions.
Akraga koa, or "gummy" caterpillar
The amazing caterpillars of this species look like something extraterrestrial. Their transparent silver body appears to be made of jelly. Due to this they are called “marmalade” or “crystal”. Their body is covered with cone-shaped processes, at the tips of which there are orange dots. The caterpillars reach only three centimeters in length. They are sticky to the touch, and the substances that their glands secrete are saturated with poison.
The insect lives in the Neotropics - a region covering the South and part Central America. You can meet it 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 a mythological hero. This time it is an ancient Greek doctor. About 40 subspecies of swallowtails are known. All of them are very colorful both at the imago stage and during the development of larvae. They are distributed throughout 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 remain in the larval state for only a month. As they grow older 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 a hidden osmeterium that is bright orange in color.
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