Great Ash Sphinx Caterpillar

What on earth is this?
I would love to know what kind of caterpillar or larvae we found our dog playing with. I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s about 4 inches long and about 3⁄4 inch in diameter.
Thanks for your help

This one took a bit of research. Seems the color phase is a little unusual. This is the caterpillar of a Northern Ash Sphinx or Great Ash Sphinx, Sphinx chersis chersis. We located some information on Bill Oehlke’s great site.

1 thought on “Great Ash Sphinx Caterpillar”

  1. Firstly, cool! Thanks for the research on that caterpillar I posted about in 2011.
    Second, you linked to my site but you have a typo in your URL – which actually links to a picture of my daughter many years ago on a horse…sometimes we called her a bug back then, and she does have a blue thing on her head, but I don’t think that’s what you were going for.

    Instead, ensure that the URL includes “p=1235” at the end (instead of “p=12”) and you’ll get the “hornworm” post I made. 🙂

    Thanks again for an awesome service!

    Reply

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