Woolly Bear Caterpillar Necklace

You see one every autumn, scurrying across the path with tremendous purpose and absolutely no time to waste. That woolly bear is not just out for a stroll. They are racing against the season itself.

The Most Important Errand in the Forest

Woolly bear caterpillars appear every fall in two generations, both of them urgently busy. The late summer generation is eating everything they can find, building up the fat reserves they will need to survive the winter. When the temperatures drop they seek out exactly the right hiding spot under fallen leaves, tuck themselves in, and do something almost unbelievable. They freeze.

Not metaphorically. They literally freeze solid. Woolly bears produce a natural antifreeze compound called glycerol in their body fluids that prevents their tissues from freezing completely, allowing them to survive temperatures as low as negative 30 degrees Celsius tucked beneath the leaf litter all winter long. When spring arrives and temperatures consistently rise above freezing they simply thaw, wake up, find something to eat, spin a cocoon, and emerge two weeks later as a beautiful Isabella Tiger Moth.

The Isabella Tiger Moth mates, lays eggs, and the whole extraordinary cycle begins again with a second generation of woolly bears in the fall, each one just as urgently busy as the last.

Leave the Leaves

This necklace was born from a collection called Leave the Leaves, created to share one of the most important things you can do for the creatures living in your garden. When we rake up and remove our fallen leaves in autumn we are destroying the winter homes of woolly bears and dozens of other insects, caterpillars, beetles, and beneficial creatures that depend on leaf litter for survival. Leaving your leaves in place, even just in a corner of your garden, is one of the simplest and most powerful acts of habitat preservation you can do.

The woolly bear on your wrist is a small and beautiful reminder of that.

The Necklace

This woolly bear was made entirely by hand from sterling silver. Every single tiny tuft of fur was individually hand cut and placed piece by piece with tweezers, because there was simply no other way to capture that signature fuzzy texture at this scale. The result is something that looks almost impossibly real, a woolly bear you could reach out and touch.

Your woolly bear will rest on a maple leaf that was etched using a real maple leaf pressed into the silver, giving every vein and edge its own natural pattern. No two maple leaves in this necklace will ever be exactly alike, just as no two leaves in the forest floor are ever exactly alike.

The pendant comes on an 18 inch sterling silver rope chain, ready to wear from the moment it arrives.

• Material: Sterling silver throughout
• Chain: 18 inch sterling silver rope chain
• Leaf: Etched from a real maple leaf, one of a kind

A Note from Tamara

I made this necklace because I have always loved the moment in autumn when you catch a glimpse of a woolly bear in the corner of your eye and then stop to watch them hurry past with such incredible determination. They always look like they are late for something. They are. But they are going to make it. They always make it. I hope this little woolly bear reminds you to leave your leaves this fall, and to think of all the tiny frozen lives sleeping safely underneath them all winter long, waiting for spring.

Made Just for You

Your woolly bear will be made to order just for you in my little studio in the New Hampshire woods. Please allow 1 to 2 weeks for them to be created. They will then be packaged safely and sent on their way to you with a tracking number so you can follow them on their journey to their new home.