why caterpillars eat their eggshells

John Grehan jrg13 at psu.edu
Thu Mar 29 22:16:37 EST 2001


>Please straighten this out.... why DO they eat their eggshells?

Probably for the same reason we eat anything at all. There is an
object that fulfulls a physiological requirement - hunger. Those
caterpillars are of such a physionlogy that they respond to the
egg shell as food and thus they eat. This may result in
nutritional or microbial benefit, but I am not aware that
the caterpillars take action with this or any other result
in mind.

John Grehan


 
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