Caterpillar Diaries (Part 5)

My ever hungry caterpillars

Since that 2nd skin change, my caterpillars have been more of a handful than they've ever been before. I feel like they've reached toddler stage. In their first week of life, they were only 2mm and would spend most of their time rarely straying from the leaves I've given them, which took them a couple of days to devour. Now, at 2cm, they are extremely mobile and have a ferocious appetite. I place some new leaves in their (slightly bigger than previous) box and they will demolish most of it in just a few hours.

Going under the kitchen towel!

When it comes to doing the daily clean, where I replace the sheet of kitchen towel and remove the leaves that they're done with, replacing with new ones, it is now more of a chore than it was a week ago. To move the caterpillars, you can not move them by hand. Instead, you use a paint brush and a teaspoon. You need to gently coax them onto the spoon with the brush to move them to the new kitchen towel covered in fresh bramble leaves. However, the caterpillars are now at a stage where they'd love to make things difficult for you. Not only are they crawling all over the place, even under the old kitchen towel and the underside of the box's lid, they also hold onto the towel as tightly as they can and refusing to let go. An instinctive natural response that works in defence against birds predating them in the wild. It is a great tactic, but an annoying one for me while I'm trying to clean them out.

May 30th Strumpshaw Fen

Dull day at Strumpshaw

I still haven't seen a swallowtail butterfly! The weather is just not on my side. It has been dull and overcast all morning. Over night, there was a heavy downpour with a few flashes of lightning. Though it was muggy enough in temperature to tempt them and other butterflies out from hiding, they just chose not to. In fact, it has been a rather quiet day all round wildlife wise. The view from outside the hides were lacking of birds. Apart from the odd flash of a kingfisher, a heron, a couple of marsh harriers and a few coots, swifts and swallows, it was not the most eventful of days.

Grey Heron

Coot

Coot Chick

Marsh Harrier

Black-headed Gull

Jay on one of the feeders

Four-spot Chaser

Dog Rose

Blue Tit

The real entertainment came in the form of a pair of blue tits that were busy feeding their chicks within the nest box at the blind beside Reception Hide. This particular nest box is built in to the post which is part of a back panel behind the blind's main wooden frame. Many visitors don't even notice it until one of the adult birds fly over their heads. They seem to be very active and once I point out their movements to the younger visitors that are off school this week, they soon became transfixed on them. They watched as the blue tits enter the box with a beakful of juicy caterpillars and leave with a faecal sac. Each time they enter, a chorus of cheeping can be heard from the hungry chicks inside. Neither of the blue tit parents seemed bothered by their human audience watching just outside.

Caterpillar Diaries (Part 4)

New look number 3. Even hairier than before!

As I said from the previous post (which was this morning), my caterpillars have been acting strange once again. And my deductions were correct, they were indeed shedding their second skin. The colour change is a great indicator that they were close to moulting. I guess the orange stripes means that the change was about to happen. That and the fact that they stopped moving while huddling together in small separate groups. Tonight, I saw at least one of them crawling around to continue eating after freshly emerging from it's old skin. Once again, this new skin is even hairier than the previous one. I'm amazed that it was only Saturday that they emerged from their first skin and they didn't shed that until almost a week after hatching. They were only in their second skin for 3-4 days. Still no sign of them becoming green yet, though.

One freshly emerged caterpillar, while another is still shedding

In the process of shedding their skins

Caterpillar Diaries (Part 3)

My Emperor Moth Caterpillars (10 days old)

I've been noticing some interesting behaviour from my caterpillars since that first skin shed. First, they seem to be more ravenous, devouring leaves much quicker and producing more and more frass. I also noticed that the odd one will sometimes curl up as if dead, which I believe as a defence mechanism as when I gently stroked them with my paintbrush, they uncurled to show signs of life. But the strangest thing I've noticed is that they keep gathering on the kitchen roll. They did that the other night and returned to feeding later on the following morning. Could they be sleeping? They've gathered again this morning, though they have yet to move on to feed. Maybe they're getting close to their second skin shed already? They are developing at a rapid pace, its hard to keep up with them!

Huddling together for either sleep or 2nd skin shed?

One curled up, perhaps playing dead?

Blog Update!

Some big news for you all today. I have finally restored all the photos to every post for 2017! It took weeks to do, but now I feel like I'm on the home stretch for bringing back all the photos I lost on this blog. What's left are 5 and a half months worth of posts from 2016 (dating as far back as the post 'My French Adventure - part 7' which was July 2016). It will still take a while until I've completed fixing this mess for good, but we're nearly there!

In other news, I had to go to hospital on Friday (May 25th) to remove a mother of all cysts from my neck. I've had the cyst since 2015, but it has only blown out of proportion in this last month. Antibiotics failed to calm it down and it was causing a lot of pain, so I had get it lanced and drained at the hospital. It will take a while for the wound to heal, meaning that I need to be careful when it comes to wearing the straps of my binoculars and bridge camera from now on.



After the operation  (A lot came out of it!)

The giant cyst that was on my neck!

Caterpillar Diaries (Part 2)

Much hairier 2nd skin (with the old skin on the left)

A day on and I believe that the majority of my caterpillars have shed their skin. I'm still a bit confused on which has shed and which haven't, but there's no question that there's an obvious size difference and that they are much hairier than before. They also look a much blacker than the old skins now, so I am completely certain that the skin shed was successful. I was surprised that they turned out to remain black and not a shade close to green yet, though.

Not sure if this group has all shed yet, so I shall leave the cleaning out an extra day

Caterpillar Diaries (Part 1)

One of my Emperor Moth caterpillars

After 5-6 days busily eating, my emperor moth caterpillars are now at a stage where everything has temporarily come to a stand still. They've been extremely active and were happily eating away at the bramble leaves I've been given them, producing a lot of tiny poo (called frass) in return. But now, they have huddled together on the kitchen towel appearing as if they are dead. However, they are not dead (at least I hope not). What they are doing is shedding their skins for the first time.

Clustering together for their first skin change

A caterpillar will do this 4-5 or more times in their development. They are stuck tight to the surface they are on, using a bit of silk around their hind legs and just like removing a pair of trousers using only your feet, they will wiggle out of their baby skin and continue what they have left off. This process may take two days and I cannot interfere until the skin shedding is done. All I can do is wait. In the mean time, I can watch the change happening as they are not only getting bigger, but also starting to change colour from black to brown.

May 23rd Strumpshaw Fen

The Meadow Trail

It was chilly start at Strumpshaw this morning, not the best conditions for those seeking swallowtails. However, it did brighten up as the morning went on. That didn't mean much to me though, as I was unlucky this time round. Oh well! Maybe next week. At least the Norfolk hawkers didn't let me down. I saw one of these patrolling the sand cliff area instead of the ditches of the Meadow Trail. Speaking of which, the Meadow Trail is now open and while it is still pretty early for the displays of orchids, I did see a handful out in bloom as well as bog bean, marsh valerian and other wildflowers emerging through the vast blades of grass. The ditches took until the warmth of the afternoon to really get going in dragonfly life with four-spot chasers and hairy dragonflies claiming their territories along these narrow stretches of water.

Norfolk Hawker

Four-spot Chaser

Azure Damselfly

Bog Bean

Southern Marsh x Early Marsh Orchid hybrid?

Yellow Flag Iris

Ragged Robin

Marsh Valerian





Cotton Grass

Common Twayblade

Common Wasp

Hoverfly Myathropa florea?

Sawfly?

Brimstone

Cuckoo

As I mentioned, it was pretty chilly as I arrived this morning due to an overcast sky and a cold wind blowing. I endured it for at least an hour inside the Fen Hide before heading back to start my shift at 9:30am. A male cuckoo was showing nicely (though slightly distant for my camera) atop of some short bushes from the right side of the hide. He called out his famous moniker loud and proud for any nearby females or rival males who could hear him. I have yet to photograph a female cuckoo. Unfortunately, he moved on before any potential mate to show up.

Chinese Water Deer

Also today; I saw a Chinese water deer appear from the edge of the reed beds in front of Fen Hide, I had a couple of hobby sightings, a kingfisher hover around the broad by Reception Hide for a bit and there many swifts, house martins and swallows on the wing. I was a bit disappointed not to see a swallowtail today, but as there were peacocks, orange-tips and brimstones emerging as the day warmed, I bet that one showed up this afternoon as I was heading for home.

Grey Heron

Common Tern