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Any idea what these guys are?
Greetings:
We live on an island in the Souther Caribbean (although many of our non-native insects have arrived from the US on ornamental plant imports. We found one of our ornamental trees covered with these caterpillars this morning — they were not obvious as late as yesterday. Do you have any idea of what they are and what is the bast way to control them? many thanks
Alan Gross

Hi Alan,
These are Tetrio Sphinx Caterpillars, Pseudosphinx tetrio. It is native to the Central and South American tropics, but is also found in Florida. The caterpillars feed on plumeria and other members of the dogbane family. You can hand pick the caterpillars, but you might also want to just let them be as they will not seriously harm the plants. The leaves they eat will be replaced by new leaves.

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