Meet the Hickory Horned Devil

Well, you never, ever know what you're going to get into around here. Who could have known that one person's overnight visit here on August 10, 2022, would set me on a road of discovery, thought, and effort

that is only winding up now, September 12? 

But that's inspiration, and that's life when the Muse leads. And Heather was the conduit to the Muse.

A spiky, spiny, colorful, crazy Muse.

August 10, 7 pm. Heather is taking it all in. She's coming back from Chicago,

stopping to reconnect and rest.

There's so much to see and photograph and discover!

And Indigo Hill is showing well, the skies piled with huge thunderheads. 

We walked out the orchard slowly. At the end I showed her one of my littlest persimmon trees. And she looked up into its leaves and said, "Well, what's this?"

August 10, 7:14 pm. My life changed. I didn't know it yet; I just knew I was tremendously excited 

to see my second hickory horned devil on the sanctuary. And such a small one! It was barely two inches long. I hadn't even known they'd eat persimmon leaves, but the caterpillar couldn't be wrong. Heather began Googling madly on the good LTE reception we get in the orchard, and found that hickory horned devils eat a wide array of trees**, but they grow best on persimmon!

** Ash, butternut, cherry, cotton, hickory, lilac, pecan, sumac, sweet gum, sycamore, walnut...Persimmon!

Heather had to leave the morning of August 11. We went out to enjoy the better light and get some good pictures of her find. This was taken at 9:21 am. What a handsome caterpillar!

 On the morning of August 12, I walked out to visit the caterpillar and found it hanging high in the tree.

 Then I promptly found a second one! It was much smaller and lower in the tree. I couldn't believe my good luck!

By August 12, the big one was hanging sort of limply, looking like it was ready to shed. I think it was at this point I began to worry about the caterpillars. That state of worry would not abate until September 12.

You see, I didn't know that they go through periods of anorexia and inactivity before they shed their skins, and they do this four times in their caterpillar life. Like, they don't eat for a couple of days. They just hang there, looking like they've contracted something awful. (My too-informed tortured mind at work here). 

Aug 15 8:16 am--the big one has shed, and looks new and smart with white zags along its sides!

It's eating again, too, whew.

This is my last photo of the big one, from 15August, at 8:36am.

I love the red horns and the side markings. You can also see black spots on the upper back. More on those later. 

By the next morning, the big caterpillar had disappeared. 

I could find only the little one. 

15Aug 8:36am--little one.

I kept thinking I'd see the big one again, but it never happened. There were so many yellow-billed cuckoos in the orchard at that time, I had to conclude something had grabbed and eaten the big one. And that would be right in character for a YBCU. 

16 August, 8:25 AM.  I worried more with each passing day that this one would meet the same fate, spikes and horns and all. That's nothing to a cuckoo. 

The fields were turning gold, and September was doing her best, but I kept thinking about the opportunity that would be lost if I didn't do something about this. 

Lined orbweaver in its tilted web.

Day after day went by and somehow it was still there to greet me each morning, though it seemed to spend most of its time hanging upside down doing nothing. 

By 10 am on August 19, it was eating and looked snappy--must have shed its skin in there somewhere.

The caterpillar became more precious to me with each passing day. Watching it change fascinated me. I knew I had something very special in it, and I also knew that could all be snatched away with one click of a cuckoo's bill. I wrestled with myself about whether to take it in. I wanted so badly for it to realize its life in the wild. But I also wanted to witness it, and to avoid the seemingly inevitable abrupt end to our budding relationship. 

I so enjoyed my pilgrimages out to the end of the orchard to find it each morning. I would miss that!

But by the evening of August 22 I had decided to take it in. 

I got Liam to come with me to embolden me to do this thing I had thought and fought so hard and long to do.

Aug 22, 2022, 7:04 pm. The little one is now the size of the big one when it was eaten. Something about saving it felt right now. It was just too plump and tempting a target. I had to intervene.

Liam snapped this of me as we walked back from the end of the orchard. Just a woman and her 

foster worm.

I had bought a zip-up laundry basket I could keep it in, I thought. I clipped some persimmon branches and put them in water.

But as always, Nature led me down another path--the right one. 

To be continued...