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A caterpillar is the
larval form of a lepidopteran (a member of the insect order comprising
butterflies and moths). Caterpillars have long segmented bodies
and many sets of "legs". They eat leaves voraciously,
grow rapidly, shed their skins generally four or five times, and
eventually pupate into an adult form. Caterpillars have six true
legs (being hexapods) on the thorax, up to four pairs of prolegs
on the middle segments of the abdomen, and sometimes a single
pair of prolegs on the last abdominal segment. The sawfly larva
(Hymenoptera) superficially resembles a caterpillar, but can usually
be distinguished because the caterpillar has a gap between true
legs and prolegs, whereas the sawfly does not. Another difference
is that lepidopteran caterpillars have crochets or hooks on the
prolegs.
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The gap between
the prolegs and the true legs can vary from a slight gap in some
species to a large gap in families such as the geometridae. The
geometrids, also known as inchworms or loopers, are so named because
of the way they locomote, appearing to measure the earth (the
word 'geometrid' means 'earth-measurer' in Greek). Caterpillars
do not breathe through their mouths. Air enters their bodies through
a series of small tubules along the sides of their thorax and
abdomen. These tubules are called 'spiracles', and inside the
body they connect together into a network of airtubes or 'tracheae'.
Images 1 Through
3 Are From The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
Images 4 Through 16 Are From The U.S.D.A.
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