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Writer's pictureScott M

Inchworms?!? A new creature in S. Leucophylla

Dec 28 2019

There is a new creature feeding in the S. Leucophylla, not sure what it is but it looks like a brown inchworm. I spotted them in a survey video in the previous post.

My suspicion is that it is here to eat and is not just another trapped insect. My only evidence for this gut feeling was that they did not act like they were trapped (admittedly highly subjective). I believe that the inchworm is the larva of some creature that lives off of dead insects like the larva of the mosquito,midges and flesh flies described earlier

. The inchworms eventually disappeared, presumably after metamorphing and flying away.

I haven’t identified this critter yet. There is a caterpillar that lives in (and on) pitcher plants, exyra, but it looks very different. Exyra are red, spikey and far larger than the little brown caterpillars. Also there is no sign of insects eating the pitcher plant, so probably not exyra.



I spotted the inchworms in a different S. Leucophylla pitcher on March 2 2020. There appear to be a couple of dozens of them in there, inching around. Note also there are a few ants roaming around to provide scale. At around 2 minutes a couple of inchworms seemed to wave at the ant or maybe they were trying to scare the ant off. Who knows.



Inching along... Screenshot from March 3


I think I accidentally spotted the eggs for the inchworms. I looked through my older videos and found these strange balls in the same S. Leucophylla pitcher on Feb 23 2020. I remember thinking "What the heck is that!" at the time. But I see a lot of strange things inside pitcher plants. Eventually the strange balls disappeared and the inchworms appeared. That they were inchworm eggs seems reasonable. (It is possible the insect in the video is the mother, but I can't believe I caught her in the act of laying eggs. Still, stranger things have happened)




Unfortunately, I was not recording daily, so I don't have a great timeline on the inchworm. I spotted the "eggs" on Feb 23 and the next time I recorded this pitcher was March 3 2020. That eight day leaves a great deal unknown. How long were the eggs there and how long were the inchworms there? They could have hatched on the 24 or March 2. The inchworm phase could be a week or a day, or something in between. One thing is for sure is that all of the inchworms were gone on March 4 all of the inchworms were gone! Nothing inside the pitcher but a few doomed ants.




Also, it is possible that the inchworms spotted on Dec 29 and again on March 2 are different species, but I can not make that determination from these videos.

Damn it, Jim. I'm a Doctor, not an entomologist!





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