Asteroid Alton Jones

If I had my life to live over, I would have become an environmental biology teacher and spent my career informing kids about the wonders of the natural world. Of course, I don't have the option of a restart, but, however late I am arriving, I can live part of that dream by teaching... well, inspiring... environmental ed teachers. That was my charge today, and I thoroughly enjoyed myself as I worked with a group of wonderful educators who'll be running the school program at the University of Rhode Island's W. Alton Jones Campus. At the edge of a meadow, we discovered this remarkable caterpillar in its striped coat of many vibrant colors. I didn't immediately know its identity, and I told the group that ignorance could be their best friend... if you could get your students to help you with the identification process. I channeled them as I worked at home through the pages of Dave Wagner's Caterpillars of Eastern North America guide and eventually arrived at page 388, The Asteroid. Cucullia asteroides is a brilliant larva of a drab adult, and I'd dearly love to know how it got its unlikely name.