What's Your Nature?

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Tree Caterpillars?

Posted by Abigail Nissen,
North Country explorer from Nassau, New York
September 8, 2016

Every time I drive through Long Lake and Indian Lake, I have to stop at this little pull-off on Lake Durant. It's a nice break from the drive home, and I can always hear animals: at nighttime I hear coyotes, in the morning I hear birds, and if I'm lucky I'll hear a loon in the afternoon. On this visit, however, I was paying more attention to what I could see than what I could hear. On the trees by the road, about ten feet off the ground and up, there were what looked to be globs of white cotton candy. When I got closer, I saw that there were actually nest-like webs filled with caterpillars. I couldn't get closer to the webs themselves, but I tried to zoom in on my camera. I'm not sure what they are - they look different from the tent caterpillars we used to get downstate. Does anyone know what they are?