Saddleback caterpillar
Somewhere early in
life, I was told that fuzzy caterpillars can sting. Later, I
discovered that all caterpillars that turn into moths (instead of
butterflies) are fuzzy, but only a few sting. Yet, I kept my
distance anyway.
I finally got stung by a caterpillar for the
first (and second time) in mid September. This saddleback
caterpillar was hiding in the blueberries and I accidentally
brushed my finger against it while picking. The surprising
pain made me jump away and then forget about the caterpillar, so
the critter managed to sting me again a few days later when I came
back to finish harvesting that spot.
Luckily, the sting
wasn't very bad --- not worth spending decades avidly avoiding an
entire sub-order for. It felt like I'd walked through a
patch of stinging nettles, meaning the pain was intense for a
minute, noticeable for an hour, then quickly forgotten. (To
be fair, though, I have a high tolerance for stings.)
If you live in my
neck of the woods, you
can see all of our poisonous caterpillar species here. Like snakes, I figure it's worth
learning the few poisonous species so you'll know everything else
is harmless. Then you can start enjoying
the beautiful permutations of nature without worrying about your skin.
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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I was stung by a puss caterpillar once (you can see them on the link you posted) and lord-all-mighty it hurt! I was only about twelve at the time, but remember my whole arm turned numb after the intense pain went away. I thought I was going to die. I've my best to stay away from fuzzy caterpillars ever since.
Interestingly, my dad told me it was a saddleback at the time. But I remember what it looked like quite clearly, and on the link you sent it says that's a puss caterpillar.