Yikes! That is one massive caterpillar!! We used to see chemtrails all the time in Texas. I haven't seen any around where we live in Panama (we literally never see planes flying here at all - we did see a helicopter the other day and it was like we had never seen one before). I sure hope you can find an answer to those caterpillars. If something is as big as your pinkie finger and it shouldn't be, that's pretty creepy!