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Caterpillar ID
Hi,
I live in South Florida.
I’ve been ’searching and squishing’ Tomato Hornworm caterpillars on my tomato plants for over a month now. (Resisting temptation to use poisons). I’m sending you a quite nice photo I took of one before the squish, in case you want it for your site. Today I found a large, superficially similar caterpillar on my fig tree. I know it’s not the same. But what is it? I’m including two photos of the ‘fig caterpillar’. I suspect it’s a butterfly. I’ve included a photo of a pair of one species I found mating there, and two of another butterfly that spent a lot of time in the tree. The lone butterfly is a species I’d never even seen before. The tree can well spare a few leaves, and there’s only one of these caterpillars as far as I can tell, so I’ve left it alone. I’m curious to know what it is and if you can identify the butterflies as well, that would be lovely.
Marian Mendez

Ruddy Daggerwing	Julia Butterflies Mating

Hi Marian,
We are very excited to receive your letter and your wonderful photographs. Your single butterfly is a Ruddy Daggerwing, Marpesia petreus. They also have caterpillars that eat the leaves of figs. Your mating butterflies are Julias, Dryas iulia. They are common in Florida. The host plant for caterpillars is the Passion Flower Vine. We will also be including this image in our new Love Among Bugs page. Also check out Marian’s Caterpillars.

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3. Ficus Sphinx Green Morph and Tomato Hornworm (July 2, 2005)
4. Zebra Longwing Metamorphosis and Mating, and Julia Caterpillar (June 29, 2007)
5. Ruddy Daggerwing: Caterpillar and Imago (May 14, 2009)