It's a few weeks since a little gift of eggs was left in my Lady's Bedstraw in my flower border. I was so excited that I wrote a blog about it, delighted that a plant I had grown specially had finally been used for the purpose I intended. I looked forward to the day when they would turn into a clutch of bouncing babies.

Well, that date has come. And here is one of my seven bouncing babies that have survived so far, all green and rubbery and chomping away merrily.

You can hopefully make out that the tail ends (on the left) with a perfectly curved little 'thorn'. Once you see that, you know that you have the caterpillar of a hawkmoth.

And the grass-green colour, flecked with little white 'warts' and with yellow lines along the side just like the stems of Lady's Bedstraw are proof that this is indeed a Hummingbird Hawkmoth.

I expect my caterpillars to pupate in another week or so, and after that they have about a month in the pupa before they emerge. That gives the new adults just enough time, if the weather is kind and we get some warm October days, to either migrate south, or to find somewhere very sheltered and frost-free to hibernate.

Oh, the joys of being a father!