Thanks for the comments, guys.
Bruce, I'm happy to have contributed to your already extensive vocabulary!
Your description and Wikipedia link are exactly correct.
In my area, all of the cutworms that I know of are noctuid moth larvae. They look much like the beast pictured here, except that they're usually tan, gray, or some combination of those.
Many critters that look like this do not actually have the cutworm feeding habit, or have it only for some food plants and not for others. I have to take special precautions, for example, to keep my garden grape vines from being de-budded early in the spring. An apron of aluminum foil at the base of the vine works wonders. Without it, almost all of the early buds will be completely devoured by caterpillars that climb the vine at night, feed, then climb down again before dawn.
The guys in the local university's agriculture department report that local commercial growers have similar problems. In their case, the current villain is actually a European immigrant that you are most likely familiar with:
Noctua pronuba, the
Large Yellow Underwing.
My problems have been with some other species, though, since we have had problems for years, but this year was the first that I have seen
pronuba adults in my yard.
As to a better ID on the pictured caterpillar, Richard Worth of the Oregon Department of Agriculture offers that:
It looks to me like maybe a heliothine noctuid, like Heliothis or
Helicoverpa. They can be highly variable in color too. Probably
looking for a place to pupate or hibernate or whatever they do this
time of year.
Google searches on those names certainly do turn up many critters that look like this one, and also adults that look like moths I have seen.
I will try to get this thing through the winter alive. With luck we can find out next spring what it is.
--Rik
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