Hang Tight

Green treefrog, Hyla cinerea

It's amazing what you can find during the course of a single walk. The gray treefrog and the tall grass posted earlier where also from the same walk that offered up the images in this post.
I think I took over 190 pictures that day. So much to see!

A sawfly larva of some sort, probably of the Tenthredinidae family. These guys used to fool me into thinking they were caterpillars until I learned the trick of counting the pairs of prolegs present. More than five pairs indicates it isn't a moth or butterfly cat. So what's are prolegs? Those stumpy little unjointed legs along the body.

Yellow-necked caterpillar, Datana ministra.

Pearly wood-nymph caterpillar, Eudryas unio. This one will turn into a pretty moth.

Evergreen bagworm moth larval case, Thyridopteryx ephemeraeformis. The female is wingless and never leaves the larval case.

Definite tussock moth, Orgyia definita. Despite its fierce appearance, it's not a stinging cat. Some people may be sensitive to the hairs, though. In reading about this caterpillar I learned something very interesting. It seems the females of this group are wingless and lay their eggs on the outside of their cocoons.

Apparently this caterpillar did not love the skin it was in...I guess it was getting a little too tight :) A Smartweed caterpillar, Acronicta oblinita, grows up to become a Smeared Dagger Moth.

This little fellow was tricky to spot, but he couldn't hide from the eagle-eyed Treebeard! We aren't 100% sure about the ID of this one. It is probably a Gray Hairstreak caterpillar, Strymon melinus.

Another tussock moth. This one is the White-marked tussock, Orygia leucostigma. Some people may experience allergic reactions when the hairs of this cat come in contact with the skin, particularly in sensitve areas like the stomach, inner arm or back.

Spittle mass from, you guessed it, a spittlebug (Cercopidae family). The nymph forms the spittle from secreted fluids. The adults in this family look like leafhoppers, to which they are closely related.