Day 39: don't fear the reaper

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OUR TOP STORY TONIGHT!

bird chow chow!

Quarantine day 39: The staff here at the Nature News Network had to dust off our copy of Blue Öyster Cult to write this one.


Simply put “Don’t Fear the Reaper.” The webworms are out and yes they are reaping the lush green leaves of wild cherry trees and a few others. But chill out, put away your pesticide.

The eastern tent caterpillar (Malacosoma americanum) is the larva stage of a rather nondescript small brown moth. Early last summer, the females laid their varnish-coated egg masses — hundreds of eggs — in the crotches of trees. They were very particular. They only laid their eggs on the trees whose leaves their young would eat. Cherries, apples and crabapples are their most common host plants.

The eggs remain there for over nine months like little time capsules. In early spring the tiny larvae hatch and begin spinning a small silken tent where they live protected during the day. At night the caterpillars venture out in mass to eat leaves; their sole purpose in life.

But here’s the deal and it’s a very big deal. Caterpillars are bird chow. And the carefully woven silk nests are nature’s bird feeders.

Bluebirds and other nesting birds feed their nestlings caterpillars by the dozens. Of the hundreds of tent caterpillars carefully laid en masse by their mamas, probably only 2 or 3 survive to repeat the process. (Notice I said "probably" I have no real data. But I also do not have 100,000 tent caterpillars, offspring of last year's clutches.)

As the song goes, “Come on baby, don’t fear the reaper, Baby take my hand, don’t fear the reaper, We’ll be able to fly, don’t fear the reaper.”

And we’ll close by adding more cowbell.

NNN signing out.

La, la, la, la, la.

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