Definitely catterpillar droppings. We'd get them regularly during their hatching season. The caterpillars can grow from smaller than those droppings to the size of your palms in a matter of 2-3 days and are very, very green So they might have already left before you noticed. Keep watch whether you find droppings only under certain plants. Butterflies lay eggs on certain plants they like and their catterpillars can feed from. You might have a problem if there are too many at the same time. I once had to pick off 12 from a 1.5 foot Curry sapling.
This doesn’t in any way answer the question but it did bring to mind a play I must have seen 45 years ago at Leicester’s Phoenix Theatre.
Can’t remember the name of the play, can’t remember the plot but I do remember a mad German scientist exhorting people to be silent. “I want you to be as quiet as pins,” he said, “I want to hear a mouse dropping.”
Thanks so much everyone. Caterpillars make perfect sense. Given that the droppings are underneath an aquliegia I am now on the lookout for sawfly larvae!
This doesn’t in any way answer the question but it did bring to mind a play I must have seen 45 years ago at Leicester’s Phoenix Theatre.
Can’t remember the name of the play, can’t remember the plot but I do remember a mad German scientist exhorting people to be silent. “I want you to be as quiet as pins,” he said, “I want to hear a mouse dropping.”
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Can’t remember the name of the play, can’t remember the plot but I do remember a mad German scientist exhorting people to be silent. “I want you to be as quiet as pins,” he said, “I want to hear a mouse dropping.”
Picidae said: I'm always in favour of a random thread reply.