Tasmania – Underbark Caterpillars
While looking under the bark of decaying logs and stumps, I found a lot of these silk tunnels, with caterpillars inside of them.
When prodded, they would writhe around and crawl out of their tunnels.
They were a bit over an inch long, and kind of silvery-gray with black spots and distinct body segments.
I can tell that these are caterpillars of some moth or butterfly, and not another beetle grub, because they had the appropriate number of prolegs running the whole length of their bodies.
This actually looks, and acts, pretty similar to a North American species, the Dead-Wood Borer, Scolecocampa liburna. This surprises me a bit, because I haven’t seen the Dead-Wood Borers here in northern Michigan, yet here is something oddly similar on the other side of the planet.
The big question is whether this is a native Australian species that happened to converge to the same appearance and lifestyle as a North American species, or just a North American species that happened to be carried to Australia accidentally. Given that it lives under the bark of dead trees, and logs are something commonly shipped all around the world, it is quite possible that these were accidental introductions to Australia. Also, in BugGuide’s list of references relevant to this species, the book “Moths of Australia” is included, so this species is looking more likely all the time.
Caterpillars mostly don’t eat wood, so these are kind of unusual. It is believed that they don’t actually eat the wood directly, but are browsing on the fungus that is digesting the wood for them. This means that they aren’t actually a lumber pest, because they will only be in wood that is already rotten.
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I wish the dogs next door had an underbark.
Ba-da-bump!
Wow, those are some great pictures!