I love Rhizo_1’s idea of putting them in the bird bath. Caterpillars of all varieties are crucial for birds raising their young. It can take several thousand caterpillars to raise one hatchling to fledgling size. Baby birds can’t eat seeds or fruit, so depend entirely on insects, worms and caterpillars that their parents can bring back to them. Many birds raise two or three clutches of eggs each summer, so they are always in need of live food. Even if you don’t have space for a formal bird bath, you could set a bowl of water on the ground near the tomato plants. It’s even possible the birds might start finding the caterpillars on the tomato plants and save you having to remove them. Martha

hahahaha i’m cracking up. wonderland is also known as eastern virginia. it is a picture of my hand in a mirror... it was the only way i could get a picture of one i didn’t squish right away. they haven’t been found near plants. the antennae has given me issues with identifying it. but the small white/yellowish horizontal stripe on its abdomen seems to be a good place to start. i’ve been looking at pictures! the only other thing that i could consider relevant is that it’s been rainy here for the last two weeks so not sure if he and his friends are looking for a dry spot

I'll try that (it's been raining all day here so I'll wait until it dries out a bit, hopefully tomorrow) ... there's lots of funky looking stuff under that fabric liner and I would love NOT to have to move the whole trug to another location (it's close to a garage with wood clapboard now). There are also several creamy white clusters like these, which may be completely unrelated to the wood slat damage; they look like eggs to me and may be perfectly harmless -- even beneficial??

I dont know hiw to get rid of it