While scouting for my first Bugging Out insect walk at Green-Wood Cemetery this year yesterday, I tried to photograph these tiny encased caterpillars dangling from silk lines from a Japanese Larch. When I brought the group by, there weren’t as many visible, and a couple of the attendees spotted them before me. They’re about 5-6mm long.
It looks like this a caterpillar of the Larch Case-bearing Moth, Coleophora laricella. The larvae clip off the ends of larch needles, burrow into them, and use them as protective cases. Perhaps they get wind-tossed out of the branches and work their way back up on their safety silk line, or else they’re repelling down?
Backyard and Beyond 
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