Look at those amazing spines. Aren’t they something else?
I’m a bit of a sucker for dangerous animals and plants… and this one is no exception. I’ve previous written about Florida’s stinging puss caterpillar… today we’ll take a look at this week’s visiting stinging caterpillar.
The saddleback caterpillar is not particularly dangerous, really, but it does sting like the dickens. Here’s the rest of that fellow:
This lovely stinging caterpillar was discovered on one of my yard-long beans by the children. Fortunately no one bumped into him.
I love the way the saddle looks – really a beautiful creature.
The spines are also lovely. The saddleback caterpillar is like a little stinging assault vehicle.
They don’t really do much damage to plants, fortunately, so I just leave them alone to grow up into moths and fly off to go make little stinging babies.
To wrap up, here’s a little video I did of this particular saddleback caterpillar:
Florida is truly a weird and wonderful place. Even our poisonous caterpillars look cool.
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10 responses to “Another Florida Stinging Caterpillar: The Saddleback Caterpillar!”
That's a nasty one! We have it around here.
I got stung by one of the pus caterpillars last year, dreadful pain. So bad, I was crying like a baby and had to have my husband drive me to one of those walk-in clinics. It was the worse pain I had ever felt – worse than the worst ant bite or wasp/bee sting, worse than stinging nettles (and those take a couple days to go away even with a baking soda poultice), worse even than giving birth to a nine pound baby at home. Indescribable agonizing pain.
I took a Benadryl, poured antihistamine on the finger before getting to the clinic and the doctor prescribed a steroid. (I don’t even take aspirins normally but try to wait any aches out). I took that steroid gladly and the pain and swelling were gone by the next morning (had a pretty fitful sleep that night).
Pretty they be, but you can’t warn people enough to stay away from these creatures.
BTW, love your site. Will probably look you up at the market when we get up to Gainesville one of these days. We are in Zephyrhills and trying to figure out how to turn the denuded horse pasture into a lush jungle of edible greenery. Been here over a year and a half and are eager to plant. We are an hour from St. Pete where we lived before with a whole different climate. Yea, challenge!
I was stung by a puss caterpillar last year on the side of my hand while I was reaching up for some wild grapes. The pain radiated up my entire arm from fingertips to armpit… it was incredibly painful for the entire day.
Thanks for the nice words – I’m closer to Ocala than Gainesville if you want to come by and hit the 326 Community Market one day and say hi. There’s no time like the present to start planting.
I just got stung by one while I was doing some pruning on a shrub. Thanks for helping me figure out what it was. So far it is not too bad. Not nearly as painful as a spider bite I got once. This guy is pretty little, so I must not have gotten too much venom. It’s definitely radiating up my arm. And my first instinct was to make a baking soda paste. It helps a lot to neutralize the sting!
You bet. And I’m glad it wasn’t a really bad hit. Man alive, they can really nail you.
I was Stung when I was 7. My hand and arm hurt bad and swelled up. My dad told me to suck it up. Never touched one again.
Yeah – they’re awful stingers. They are very tempting for children to pick up.
[…] is a saddleback caterpillar. I have covered these guys in a previous post and video. If you see one, watch out – they […]
Very uninformative. Okay, it’s pretty and stings.
It also likes pina coladas and making love at midnight, at the dunes on the cape.