Post by nomihoudai on Jun 19, 2013 14:43:30 GMT -8
When I started this hobby I was always wondering where people would get their livestock from. I guess one valid answer is chance. Last year I was hunting some microlepidoptera when I stumbled upon 6 Saturnia pavonia caterpillars sitting right in front of me on some Rubus sp. . They were in L4 stage and I took them with me and could bring 5 of them to pupate. Earlier this year one female hatched but I didn't have a male for it. One day after returning from work I saw a male Saturnia pavonia flying in front of the balcony glass door, I grabbed my net and put it into the flight cage to the female but they didn't want to pair. Later that day I took a walk in the fields in front of my apartment and was about one kilometre away from home. In the field another male Saturnia pavonia crossed my path in direction of the town and I knew exactly where it was going. When I was home it was actually at my balcony and I managed to catch it. This time I took it with its wings and put it directly onto the female. The male grabbed it and they paired immediately. I received a batch of 210 eggs and decided to try a mass breeding of the species.
I think it was about 10 days afterwards that the caterpillars hatched. Not every egg hatched, but about 180 of them which still is a lot. I decided to use Corylus sp. instead of Rubus sp. as a hostplant. Hazle has much larger leaves and in L5 I would need massive amounts of food. I always keep my caterpillars in plastic containers with closed lid. This obviously only works for easy to rear species that can cope with the higher humidity. The closed lid keeps the food fresh for longer times and I only need to add new leaves every 3 days. At this moment I also clean the box. Most caterpillars that died did so in L1, mostly because they didn't accept the hostplant or where just too weak after getting out of the egg shell.
In L3 they change from all black with orange to all black with green.
L4:
In L4 two different color morphs started to appear. I learned that the darker form is correlated to the amount of UV the caterpillars receive and the darker form is more common in a darker environment. Indeed the box was pretty dark in order to keep the temperature down.
L5, I had to give them larger boxes multiple times. In the end I just use large 20L boxes with mosquito net as topping. In this stage they need daily cleaning and the food dries out much faster.
And finally what I had been working for during the last 6 weeks, 136 cocoons:
I hope people enjoy the pics,
Claude.
I think it was about 10 days afterwards that the caterpillars hatched. Not every egg hatched, but about 180 of them which still is a lot. I decided to use Corylus sp. instead of Rubus sp. as a hostplant. Hazle has much larger leaves and in L5 I would need massive amounts of food. I always keep my caterpillars in plastic containers with closed lid. This obviously only works for easy to rear species that can cope with the higher humidity. The closed lid keeps the food fresh for longer times and I only need to add new leaves every 3 days. At this moment I also clean the box. Most caterpillars that died did so in L1, mostly because they didn't accept the hostplant or where just too weak after getting out of the egg shell.
In L3 they change from all black with orange to all black with green.
L4:
In L4 two different color morphs started to appear. I learned that the darker form is correlated to the amount of UV the caterpillars receive and the darker form is more common in a darker environment. Indeed the box was pretty dark in order to keep the temperature down.
L5, I had to give them larger boxes multiple times. In the end I just use large 20L boxes with mosquito net as topping. In this stage they need daily cleaning and the food dries out much faster.
And finally what I had been working for during the last 6 weeks, 136 cocoons:
I hope people enjoy the pics,
Claude.
