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silky owl caterpillars

Taenaris sp.

Photo by Scott Frazier
Published on Project Noah
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-2.56315, 140.504

Field Notes

Description:

An infestation of caterpillars which have almost succeeded in completely denuding an Areca palm tree (see last photo). Other palms nearby were unaffected.The caterpillars were covered in hairs and each was about 60 mm in length. Two days later the caterpillars were nowhere to be seen.

Habitat:

On an Areca palm (Areca catechu) in a large semi-urban yard & garden near a disturbed patch of remnant forest, in the equatorial tropics of northern New Guinea.

Notes:

Identified to genus by EarlyStages through examination of original digital images. An adult of the genus can be seen here http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/7158708 The featured species may or not be the adult form of these caterpillars. Another species of Taenaris caterpillars can be seen here http://pngnature.wordpress.com/2012/09/01/taenaris-myops/

Reference Links:

Taenaris - Overview

Species ID Suggestions

Comments (3)
EarlyStages
In the interest of context and helping others, here's part of what I shared with Scott privately: Yes, these are Taenaris (Nymphalidae, Satyrinae, Amathusiini) larvae, the spined "horns", monocot hostplant, and moth-like appearance being essentially diagnostic. As you can see from the attached image of T. catops that I reared from Timika, our two caterpillars differ significantly, thus I can only wonder as to the specific identity of yours (possibly T. artemis is my educated guess). Immature Taenaris are rarely photographed, so congratulations on a very cool spotting!

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Biota of S. Frazier's Yard at Sentani, Papua, Indonesia

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Photographed
PublishedAugust 28, 2013

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