Caterpillar Facts

The chemical con trick used by Alcon blue butterfly larvae to get ants to take care of them has been detailed by scientists working in Denmark.


Caterpillars grow through a series of moults; each intermediate stage is called an instar.
Caterpillars have 4,000 muscles (compare humans, with 629).

In some places, the number of caterpillars feeding on plants is so large that you can actually hear them munching

Some Arctic moths may spend 14 years as caterpillars, only active a few weeks each summer.

Some caterpillars eat as much as 27,000 times their body weight to support their lives as flying insects.

Most caterpillars may have 12 eyes, but they are primitive and can do little more than sense light and dark.

The caterpillar fungus is a traditional medicine that has been widely used as a tonic and/or medicine by the Chinese for hundreds of years

The use of this fungus was relatively unknown in this country until it was credited for the success of Chinese women athletes at the National Games in Beijing, in 1993. Three Chinese track runners set new world records during the Games. Their coach, Ma Zunren, attributed the runner?s success to due to a stress-relieving tonic prepared from the caterpillar fungus

Butterflies and moths start out as eggs. These hatch into caterpillars, which go through a pupa or metamorphosis stage and then evolve into the winged version. The cycle can take as little as 3 weeks in the tropics and many months in colder climes. Cold climate species can hibernate for as long as 9 months.

A caterpillar has a head and 13 body segments. There are only three pairs of real legs and five pairs of sucker-like prolegs or false legs at the back, with hooks for grabbing. It breathes through small holes on the segments.

Many caterpillars can produce silk, which they can use to avoid predators (by hanging from branches) and which they use for protection (a cocoon).

The Zebra caterpillar becomes poisonous by eating poisonous foods and has sharp spines, while the butterfly smells very bad. The Puss moth caterpillar spits acid on predators.

Caterpillars have been called "eating machines", and eat leaves voraciously
Most species shed their skins four or five times as their bodies grow larger, and they eventually pupate into an adult form.

Most caterpillars are solely herbivorous. Some are cannibals, and others prey on caterpillars of other species