It could be a yellow bear/Spilosoma virginica, Mary. If it is, it's got longer, thinner hair than you usually see.
Sherry

Here is a link that might be useful: Yellow Bear

That face! Don't you love it, Mary?

Meant to ask, and not to change the topic, but I am wondering how your Redring Milkweeds are doing. I hope I'm not being a pest about it, but so few grow it since it is kind of rare, and you are one of the few, other than Sandy, that have been successfully growing it.

Susan

Yes, I'm successful, ha, ha, ha, succesful at raising redring for the gophers. The gopher got another one of the milkweeds over the weekend. Don't know when.

Sandy

Mary,

I think your caterpillar is "The Laugher", or Charadra deriden, a moth. I found one once. It's the face that makes me think that way. Kind of a wicked-looking laughing face, if I remember correctly. I always thought it was the "Jim Carrey" of caterpillars--don't know why!

Sandy

I left the s off of deridens. I finally found my photo of the caterpillar I found. I'm hoping you can open the link. I posted it on our local lep site.

Unfortunately, the lep site is with Y-hoo, and Gardenpost regards my attempted post as spam. If only they were as efficient with the real spam.

Sandy

Sandy,

I believe you are correct, that it is "The Laugher", or Charadra deridens. I thank you and Sherry for the lookups. I googled images on line and the little face looks the same as the 'Laugher'. I wonder if he hitched a ride in on a Butterfly Bush I bought yesterday? I watered the plant well after placing it on the deck and the watering might have caused him to move off of it. Since I didn't know what he would eat, I put him down in the garden last night. I hope he finds something he can eat as he was so sweet. Yes, Susan, that little face was just precious. It reminds me of the faces of the little white seal pups with the big eyes.

Susan, my redrings are doing fine so far, except for one baby. It dried out in the top, then the leaves slowly dried up and fell off. The little stem is now drying out. I can't see a wound on the stem so I don't know what might have happened. I'll look for it next spring, hoping the roots will survive. Even though I had several RedRing flower heads, not one seed pod was produced! It blooms the earliest of all the milkweeds I've tried to grow, maybe there aren't enough pollenizers around that early in the spring. This might be part of the reason it is declining in the wild. Although, come to think of it, the wild one I found two years ago was blooming later in the summer but it looked like it had been mowed down at some point so maybe it was a second growth I found.

I'm so nervous to mess around very much with the RedRing MW; just trying to keep hands off and let nature take care, although I do check them over each day. It is such a pretty plant; hope we can get some more growing and producing seed. I did have one baby actually bloom this year so I'm hopeful it will produce several flower heads next season, along with the wild one. Last year the wild one only put up one stalk (if I'm remembering correctly) and this year it put up four stalks and all had several flower heads, just no seed pod. Do you have RedRing growing in your garden?

Mary

Oh, no, Sandy! Grrrrrrrrr.....for those darned gophers.

I had one Redring last year that did not come back or my gardener accidentally pulled it up this spring. I know I don't have gophers here in the city. So no more for me. It's too delicate for me to grow with confidence.
I still have other milkweeds in the garden, A. speciosa, A. incarnata, A. curassavica, A. tuberosa (small still), and Cynanchum laeve that comes up wherever it wants.

But I like to check and see how you and Sandy are doing with yours!

Susan

Sandy what is the local lep site?
~Laura

OMG!! Anyone have a hairbrush?? Too cute!

That little guy is very cute! :)

Laura, it's okleps on Y-hoo. It's one of the Y-hoo groups. You can join and keep up with the counts, etc. We aren't really a very active group, but John Fisher and Dr Nelson (also John) are good at identifying bugs. They've helped me more than anyone else except Ladobe, who used to post here.

sandy