Elephant hawk moth caterpillar

[martyp]

Hi all,
I was doing a bit of 'weeding' in the back garden earlier and pulled up a Rosebay Willowherb from underneath my Japanese Banana only to see a really big Elephant Hawk caterpillar on it. I panicked a bit to get the plant into a pot and hope it'll recover (pulled it up with the roots).
I brought it indoors as I thought it'd be great to show my other half how beatiful the moths are, let alone the caterpillars themselves.
The thing is, I'm worried that my keeping it indoors the moth would emerge before the winter and there'd be less chance of it finding a mate when released...
I don't want to have a negative effect on the local population so wasn't sure what the likelihood might be of a second generation of the moth in September in the wild?
It'd be a bit of a moral issue as I'd love to see the moth but also help local populations. Another angle is that I'd be helping to protect it from predators as well as parasites (hoping I won't see a number of little wasps appear when pupating).

[charlieb]

Originally Posted by martyp

that my keeping it indoors the moth would emerge before the winter

Yes, if you kept it in doors - if you want to keep it to watch it develop, keep it inside until it has pupated and then move it outside, e.g. in a shed, to keep it in sync with the rest of the population.