Caterpillar's on white pine trees

[Ken_f]

Caterpillar\'s on white pine trees

Just out walking and came across these (photo attached)
on my stand of pines. The bag worms are coming out and
I spend a good bit of time picking them off. So, any ideas what these are ??? Something else to worry about ?? I don't like to spray and kill the good bugs and these don't look good.

Thanks,

Ken

 

[Richard]

Re: Caterpillar\'s on white pine trees

those look to me like the rare flesh eating 'Eatus Humans Worm"... The rumor I'm starting about them is that their bite is worse than a pirahannas........best to flee /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Actually, I've not a clue. /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

Growing up in Ohio, we had bagworms on a mulberry tree and they simply ate it up, as I got older, I learned that bagworms were to be burnt up with flames /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif We (or neighbors when I was a child) never sprayed them as best I could tell, they lit up an oil soaked rag and turned them into little worm crisps.

Richard

 

[Ken_f]

Re: Caterpillar\'s on white pine trees

Yes.. I have discovered that too.. Those bag worms do burn.
I guess you have to worry about that when you build your little house out of dried pine needles.

These buggers are different. And they are eating the needles.

I have 2-3 acres of 10-15 year old pines. I watch them close as I don't want someting bad to establish themselves.

Ken

 

[Bird]

Re: Caterpillar\'s on white pine trees

I'm wondering whether the same kind of worms are called something different in different parts of the country or if we (or maybe just me) are confusing two different kinds of worms. The bag worms can be controlled with malathion or diazinon or even simply picking the bags off the trees (usually evergreens). The web worms can also be controlled with insecticides, but they are the ones we used to burn out of the plum and peach trees when I was a kid. We'd take a corncob and stick a very stiff heavy wire in one end for a handle, dip the corncob in kerosene and light it for a torch and burn the webs out of the trees.

 

[kubotasaurus]

Re: Caterpillar\'s on white pine trees

I just got done spraying my pines with Sevin - it's a stomach poison so only kills things eating them.

At first sight looks like you have European Pine Sawfly Larvae. Scroll down a bit on the page to see them.

Try calling Penn State too - there is a list of contacts on their Christmas Tree web site