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Post by bluemoth on Sept 23, 2011 17:53:38 GMT -8
Hay Timo you are right. Beetles are very popular. Right now I trade beetles with two people for moths and butterflies. I get Rain Beetles in November. Those are super popular indeed. I am willing to collect any insect group for any one if they want to pay me a little money.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 23, 2011 8:49:06 GMT -8
Well I have not found a job yet so I am breeding rare forms of the Common Buckeye butterfly, Junonia coenia to sell to collectors. Although at this point I just am making a little pocket change I expect I may be doing a little better by end of next year in way of profit. I now have two different forms with an extra eye spot ( Triples ) which hope fully I will have some in spring 2012 to sell. I have Big Eyes, Blue Eyes, and new forms that I am breeding for - green and blue Buckeyes. I am using Buckeyes because the genes are so changeable and weird things can happen such as the ones with extra eye spots that are wanted by collectors. Do not have a web sight yet.
In these hard times we must be clever and think of legal things ( not drugs - do not want to be put in jail ) to make money. I am also an artist. But as it is often said there are many starving artist out there including me. Art is not selling very well in the low economy. What is really popular right now and selling well in the USA is the feather earrings I make. So some times you have to step out of your comfort zone and try some thing new to make money. I am always willing to try new things just to make a buck while I keep looking for work. The trend here in the US by companies is to hire young folks just out of collage. But older folks have a lot more working experience.
Life these days is very tuff but if we use our heads we can survive.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 16, 2011 7:38:19 GMT -8
Hay Jamesd good point. I will keep a few pinned from each generation to show the time line of change in the blue color. In fact some collectors like to have time lines of such things. I have some very nice butterflies to start with. A couple of them show a lot of blue in the fount wings in the leading edge of the postbasal part. More blue should appear in the next generation toward inner part of wing by median area. I expect 4 to 5 generations from now some butterflies may have some blue in rear wings. Breeding back to wild every so often is impotent to prevent deformities like crumpled wings or messed up antenna. These deformities can totally ruin my hole stock. Inbreeding is what makes pattern or color changes happen.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 16, 2011 7:11:26 GMT -8
Hay Star I got a lot of places I wish to go collecting to. In 2000 I had a chance to collect a few Pine Whites near Mammoth Mountain in CA. They are a very nice little white butterfly. I would love to be able to go to Washington to collect the Pine Whites there. I agree that a bunch of us should get together to go on a collecting tip next year. May be we could all chip in to rent a van and drive there. That would be a lot of fun to meet other collectors.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 15, 2011 7:17:09 GMT -8
I am familiar with the brown wasps - Ophion. They lay eggs in moth and butterfly larva. Get them at my light almost year round in west USA. Many less this year because butterfly and moth numbers are so low. How ever my book says one species of Ophion parasitises May Beetle Grubs - Phyllophaga.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 13, 2011 7:53:01 GMT -8
Well do not think these are best in the world but they are a start. Parnassians ( parnassius ) are high altitude butterflies that can be found in the mountains of the USA and Europe. It is reported that some fly when there is still snow on the ground. They are very cold hardy. They often have red dots or patches in their black spotted and bared white wings. The Whites ( Pieridae ) are one of the most wide spread groups in the world found on almost every continent. Many species to be found with spots, patches and stripes of black on white wings. Some Pieridae also have a little color often on the wing undersides like yellow, orange, brown or red. Whites are often found in fields and disturbed places. But some like the woods like the Mustard White - Pieris napi - that is rarely seen in open places. Now I know a premier butterfly to have would be a White Monarch from Hawaii. There is a lady there that breeds them. If you contact her take grate care what you say ( do not say anything about collecting insects ) because she is probably some one known as a "butterfly hugger". Butterfly huggers hate insect collectors. They refuse to talk to them or sell live stock or dead stock to them. I know this from experience with some one els that I talked to that had rare cream colored Gulf Fritillaries. Now here is the ladies web sight and her e mail that rears the rare White Monarchs: www.whitemonarchs.comdancetta@butterflyrealtor.com
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 10, 2011 7:52:02 GMT -8
Update - So one dark pupa hatched. After care full inspection I could not find anything different on the butterfly. Appears to be just a pupa color mutation.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 8, 2011 17:24:37 GMT -8
I love your video with the nice gentle music. The images you caught were stunning. I do have a guide to European butterflies so made an attempt to ID some of them. The all white one with the thin black veins was Aporia crataegi - Black Veined White. The checker board looking one was Melanargia sp. possibly M. g. galathea or M. r. japygia or M. larissa. There were some brown Satyridae - Erebia m. meolans and Maniola sp. Hopefully some native European can confirm my attempted IDs for you. The Black Veined White can not be confused with any other European butterfly.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 7, 2011 7:08:26 GMT -8
I think I can make a colored Buckeye faster than the farm did. I have worked on my Big Eyes through selective breeding for less than a year and soon in a few weeks I will have the first ones available for sale. When breeding say for an all green butterfly you have to keep only the very best with the most and brightest green. This means culling many and keeping only a select few for breeding. Then next generation do the same. Then to prevent deformities I do breed to wild every two inbred generations. This will set me back a little. I do indeed plan to work on as many colors as the butterflies provide me with. So in a year or two may be I will have a nice set of colored Buckeyes for sale.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 6, 2011 19:38:52 GMT -8
As some of you know I am rearing Buckeyes to create and sell uneak color or pattern mutations. When I saw the blue Buckeye I was truly amazed. see it here - www.Butterflyfunfacts.comIt was carefully bred by a butterfly farm selecting butterflies with a little blue iridescence in the front wing edge. Over a number of generations in a year it became all blue. I know I can do this so be prepared to see and buy my own version in a little over a year. I have seen hints of purple and green iridescence in my own live stock. So there is a hint of what is to come.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 6, 2011 19:22:37 GMT -8
Buckeye pupa are not known to overwinter. But that sure is a good point for a color change in other species that do over winter. Also the Common Buckeye dos not have different seasonal forms. Cold or difference in day length can affect a change in pattern and color such as in a form called Rosa. My larva were all reared at the same day length and warm temperature.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 5, 2011 18:02:43 GMT -8
Hi every one. Just wondering if any one has gotten dark tan and brown pupa when rearing Buckeyes? The tan color is mainly on wing pads, abdomen and thorax. The dark brown (nearly black) is on head, front triangle (legs, antenna) and cremaster. I think I got some weird color mutation here. Just wondering if some one has had a Buckeye hatch from a pupa of this color? I know that Buckeye genes are quite changeable so I am excitedly waiting the emergence of the dark pupa butterflies.
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Post by bluemoth on Sept 1, 2011 13:58:24 GMT -8
Looks like a hawk moth egg. But as to my nolage no moths feed on Jade plants, at least in the US any way. Could instead be a hardened droplet of jade plant sap. Have you noticed any sap sucking insects on your plant?
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Post by bluemoth on Aug 27, 2011 11:09:13 GMT -8
Storm chasers sharing with us on a live cam what is happening with Hurricane Irene. They just are at Pemlico sound and all water has been blone by wind to other side of sound. All they see is mud! Inccredible!
Look for : Hurricane Track. com Live Video
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Post by bluemoth on Aug 26, 2011 17:32:35 GMT -8
Hay Billgarthe how do you piggy back a few orders to only pay one inspection fee? Also I contacted FW got good info on permits. They want a list of species with each import shipment. But what if exporter dos not know name of say a few undetermined moths from South America in shipment? Dos exporter ID down to family as close as possible? Also I have seen adds in classifieds for mix of unidentified leps or bugs in the past. How is that delt with when list of names are needed for export?
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