Comments for
3 inch green worm with black and orange spikes (Hickory Horned Devil)

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HICKORY HORNED DEVIL
by: Moni

Under a tree
What kind of tree did you find him under?? they do eat other tree foliage.
Also when it is time to pupate they start to wander around to find a good place to go underground and form a cocoon.

Under a tree
by: Anonymous

I found one of these creatures just lying on the ground under a tree.. Don't live near any walnut tree or anything so not sure where it came from? (Canton, Oh)

Hickory Horned Devil
by: Anonymous

my husband found one of these worms in our
back yard under one of the pecan trees.we never seen anything like this before,needed to no if this worm was harmful.nearly 50 and never seen anything like this one in my life.lol

My son found one today
by: Anonymous

My son found one today with his friend, thank goodness I told them not to touch it! I had no clue what is was, but I did know it looked scary, and wasn't sure if it was poison-ness or not. Glad I was able to find it on this page! Thanks for all your help!

Found one today....
by: Anonymous

I live in Madison, IN. and I found one of these scarey lookin worms about 20 ft from our walnut tree and they are very intimidating lookin

Hickory Horned Devil
by: Moni

Beth
This caterpillar might eat the foliage of the pecan but is not the reason your pecans fell prematurely.
Usually tree fruits drop early due to poor pollination, or disease at time of pollination, or too many fruits for the tree to handle.
Hope that helps a little.
These are large but neat caterpillars...they do not harm humans in any way.

liberty, ms
by: Anonymous

FOund one floating down the river have never seen one before.

Found in Roswell GA
by: Anonymous

My husband was bite by one while putting up a bat house in a tree. Extremely painful followed by a horrible red rash.

Big worm
by: Beth

We found one too in georgia it is scarey looking It was near the pecan tree. All our pecans had fallen off before maturing was wondering if there are more and they are the reason we lost the pecans.

Found one today
by: Anonymous

Wow, we just found one of these and I've never seen one before. It was right under our walnut tree which makes sense. We're in south central PA. So glad we were able to identify it on here!

found one too
by: Jessie Cocks

We found one today in Kennett Square, PA! It is an AMAZING looking creature!

Found one, too
by: Anonymous

Today, we found a worm that looks just like the one in the picture. We live in Reading, PA near walnut trees. We had never seen anything like this before. We took pictures and tried to think of someone who could identify it. Thank you internet and this website. I guess we'll let it go as the comments do not seem to be upsetting. It certainly is fearsome looking.

Hickory Horned Devil
by: Moni

Your photo is of the Hickory horned devil. This is the caterpillar of the Regal or also called the Royal Walnut moth (pictures of those are in other Insect ID'ed).
These insects are found thru out the whole Eastern half of the US.
Larvae seen while they are wandering on the ground are searching for a suitable place to burrow into the soil for pupation. The size of your caterpillar indicates that is what it was doing. If he came out of the ground perhaps that spot was not to his liking. Hope it found its spot!
Larvae feed on leaves of ash, butternut, cotton, gum, hickory, lilac, pecan, persimmon, sumac, sycamore, walnut. Adults moths do not feed.
Great find!!

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