Woolly worms

[lotsaIHCs]

I know there is some lore about stripes on caterpillars or wooly worms as we call them. Something about the width of the black or red bands predicting the severity of the winter coming up. Anybody know what the lore is?

[Red Flyer]

[tractorholic]

So now we need to know which way that worm was headed. More black on one end.

[lotsaIHCs]

Those things are all over the place this year. I'll have to look and see which end has more black!

[from H to 80]

i haven't seen many yet, some years the road is covered with them.

[TomH]

I found one on Saturday, it was 100% black.....hmmm.

[tractorholic]

39 minutes ago, TomH said:

I found one on Saturday, it was 100% black.....hmmm.

I actually did too this morning.

[Red Flyer]

The one I saw here was all black as well.

[td9inidaho]

Haven't seen too many of those here, what's really bad this year is those darned stink bugs. They can slip through the tightest of windows. And flying everywhere 

 

[cobfly]

2 hours ago, TomH said:

I found one on Saturday, it was 100% black.....hmmm.

Black worms matter.

[Rawleigh99]

Looks like you guys with the all black ones are screwed this year!!!  LOL

[lotsaIHCs]

The ones I have around here have the longer black part at the head.

[Mark (EC,IN)]

I saw two yesterday,  both just had black heads, the rest was brown.

[DT Fan]

Been seeing a lot of them, color patterns are many and varied. I'll let you know ow how hard the winter is when it gets here.

One thing about winter this year, won't have to be driving 64 miles round trip on crappy roads in the dark this year!

[just Dave]

I can tell how bad the Winter will be based totally on the amount of work I did to prepare. No worms here yet?

[searcyfarms]

Not that it matters but those are tiger moth caterpillars and different type of colors/bands dictate the color subspecies of moth it produces im prettysure persimmon seeds are more accurate at predicting weather but my weather rock never fails its 100 percent accurate yr after yr

[Alan Dinan]

6 hours ago, DT Fan said:

Been seeing a lot of them, color patterns are many and varied. I'll let you know ow how hard the winter is when it gets here.

One thing about winter this year, won't have to be driving 64 miles round trip on crappy roads in the dark this year!

Also a nice warm shop to work in!!

[DT Fan]

Saw a few yesterday as I was walking around. I'll let you guys be the judges.

Middle one may be some other form of caterpillar? I'll look for more today.

[iowaboy1965]

As seen on my garage floor tonight....

[SASW6]

This is the first one I saw. Don't think I'm having a winter this year. Lol  

[U-C]

On 9/29/2025 at 12:40 PM, Rawleigh99 said:

Looks like you guys with the all black ones are screwed this year!!!  LOL

ya seen one of those too and one with a brown strip I reckon they haven't agreed to an ending yet. 

[U-C]

6 hours ago, SASW6 said:

This is the first one I saw. Don't think I'm having a winter this year. Lol  

that must mean a Blizzard is imminent  

[IH enthusiast]

seems we have more black than brown could be cold for a while.

[yellowrosefarm]

Saw one today, all brown with about 1/8th" black stripe