Читать книгу Extreme Insects - Richard Jones - Страница 31

NAME	lobster moth caterpillar Stauropusfagi
LOCATION	Europe and northern Asia
ATTRIBUTE	the most plug-ugly bug

It is the strange and unorthodox that most greatly offends our senses. This, combined with a lack of knowledge, creates fear and misunderstanding. So it is with the caterpillar of the lobster moth. And although derided as a gothic monstrosity and grotesque beast by many writers, it is not to offend or frighten humans that this strange and unorthodox maggot has evolved. Birds trying to eat it are its greatest enemies, and it is from them it must hide, or defend itself.

Early natural philosophers recorded that this peculiar animal was half spider and half scorpion. With its crustacean-like form, it is easy to see how it gets its English name. Its swollen tail has long, thin appendages, threateningly sting-like in appearance. These are the ‘anal claspers’, which in most other caterpillars are the last pair of sucker feet on the end of the caterpillar’s body. The second and third pair of front legs are also grossly lengthened and the caterpillar waves them about in an aggressive manner if disturbed.

Pretending to be dangerous is the last resort of the lobster moth caterpillar. It would rather remain motionless, undetected because it just does not look like an edible morsel. Its bizarre knobbly shape is likely to be overlooked by predators because instead of appearing like a ‘normal’ caterpillar (cylindrical, smooth, plump) it looks like a bit of shrivelled dead leaf.

The caterpillar does not always look so deformed. When it first emerges from its egg it resembles an ant, complete with long, skinny waist and round, bulbous abdomen. It can also exude formic acid, the same sharp-tasting chemical used by ants to dissuade birds from eating them. Incidentally, the word ‘lobster’, traced back through the Old English ‘lopustre’ and Anglo-Saxon ‘loppestre’ or ‘lopystr’, comes from a corruption of the Latin ‘locusta’ – perhaps an even uglier beast if its habits are taken into account.