Caterpillar turns into 6 pupae?

Nephaleim

Arachnosquire
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Nov 28, 2019
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94
I got a new hairy caterpillar and well today I wake up to find four small pupae and it's dried up she'll next to them.
Does anyone know what is going on? Could those be parasites? Or is this caterpillar actually going to turn into multiple fliers?
One pupae is about a fifth of it's caterpillar size.
20200630_120154.jpg

EDIT: I have since come to the conclusion, that unfortunately, these are parasites. That makes me sad...
 
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chanda

Arachnoking
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Jun 27, 2010
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They are defintely parasites. They look like tachinid fly pupae to me.
 

Nephaleim

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Nov 28, 2019
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94
Please keep them and post when the emerge.
The curiosity is almost sickeningly peaked.
The creatures hatched!
They look like normal flies which makes me feel a bit uneasy. I'll feed them to my spiders. After appropriately weakening them to ensure they don't do anything to my spiders.
20200708_121655.jpg
 

DaveM

ArachnoOneCanReach
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Jul 12, 2011
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Thanks for following up with photos of the flies!
I'm impressed by those that guessed correctly what would emerge.
 

chanda

Arachnoking
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Yep, those look like tachinid flies - they have the long hairs on their abdomens like the ones in your picture. You don't need to worry about them hurting your spiders if you offer them as treats. They are fairly specific on hosts, so they would parasitize caterpillars - but not spiders.
 

Nephaleim

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Nov 28, 2019
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94
That's
Yep, those look like tachinid flies - they have the long hairs on their abdomens like the ones in your picture. You don't need to worry about them hurting your spiders if you offer them as treats. They are fairly specific on hosts, so they would parasitize caterpillars - but not spiders.
Thats great to hear! I was scared to feed them the flies because I was worried. If they survive until Friday, then it's feeding day!
 

Scythemantis

Arachnobaron
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Feb 27, 2005
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499
I would've let them go. Without parasites like these, a caterpillar population can grow until it breaks out in contagious illness or expends all of its food supply, in which case not only do the caterpillars all starve to death, but so do other insects dependent on the same plants. Parasites are actually crucial to the health of food webs everywhere :)
 
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