Hickory horned devil, "Citheronia regalis"

[Ken Ramos]

Never in my life have I seen such a beast as this. I almost wet my...well, uh you know when I saw this thing. I found it during my lunchtime walk around the edge of the woods near the plant where I work. A really large and awesome looking cat. About four and a half inches in length and about as big around as ones thumb, maybe about 3/8 inch.




Citheronia regalis, fifth instar/Regal Moth
Canon G7
Manual mode/macro
1/125 sec. @ f/4 ISO 100
Daylight/sunny, in shade
(Data the same for images one and two)


Citheronia regalis, fifth instar/Regal Moth
Canon G7
Manual mode/macro
1/125 sec. @ f/3.2 ISO 100
Daylight/sunny in shade

This thing was feeding on the leaves of a Persimmon tree. I did a little light reading after identifying the cat on Buguide and found out that many people keep and raise these things. They are considered to be harmless, despite the menacing apperance. I will take their word for it. Personally I will leave it be on the Persimmon tree. I was going to post some more images from Mitchell but this cat won out on all that.

[Mike B in OKlahoma]

Very cool! I've never sen one of these for real.

[Ken Ramos]

Thanks Mike When and if you do, you will definitely be amazed at how it looks and above all its size!

[Bruce Williams]

More excellent pics with your G7 Ken. Do you use the LCD screen or the viewfinder to compose and confirm focus?

Great subject - I am just so envious!

Bruce

[jaharris1001]

Very nice images with that G7 indeed !!

[Ken Ramos]

Thanks guys I use the LCD screen, though the camera does have a manual focus feature and I have yet to try it by the way. The only thing I use on auto is the focusing and white balance.

[beetleman]

These are very awesome ken. I think they look better than the other more expensive Canons you have taken pictures with. The colors, focus and DOF are incredible.

[Ken Ramos]

Thanks Doug P & S cameras are beginning to show a great deal of promise or so it seems and I will almost agree that the G7 is producing images comparable to my 20 and 30D w/EF & EF-S lenses.

[tpe]

Wow what a beast, lovely colours sharpness and framing too. I would be tempted to hatch it our indoors so the kids could see the adult. Perhaps they are not as colourfull but they look like a flying miniture elephant when they emerge.

tim

[crotermund]

What an absolutely fantastic creature & capture, Ken. I love caterpillars and have always hoped to encounter one of these beasts. I'm certainly envious. And to even spot it while strolling around on your lunch break...such luck.

[Ken Ramos]

Tim wrote:

I would be tempted to hatch it our indoors so the kids could see the adult.

Funny you should mention it Tim. I did a little light reading on the cat and it seems that a good many people do keep these things till they hatch out. The Regal Moth is not, IMO, a very attractive specimen but not an ugly one either.

Craig wrote:

What an absolutely fantastic creature & capture, Ken. I love caterpillars and have always hoped to encounter one of these beasts. I'm certainly envious. And to even spot it while strolling around on your lunch break...such luck.

I was quite stupified myself there Craig. This is something that I did not expect to find...well, anywhere to tell the truth. It was a shock when I first saw it on the persimmon limb.

Thanks a lot guys

[MacroLuv]

Great looking caterpillar, Ken!
I did never see one like this. Superb images with G7.

[Ken Ramos]

Thanks Nikola, I had never seen one either until I ran across this one. They are magnificent creatures to see personally.