where do you buy ornithoptera species ????

[bas]

Dear fellow collectors,

yesterdays evening I ordered my first birdwings
off course im very thrilled with it and im looking forward to it. the wait for the cites permits and postage etc is part of the thrill I think.

but then I was wondering where does other collectors get them from??

oh yes I ordered the following specimens

-Ornithoptera Croesus Lydius Pair
-Ornithoptera Croesus Toeantei Pair
-Ornithoptera Priamus Hecuba Pair
-Ornithoptera Priamus Poseidon Pair
-Ornithoptera Priamus Priamus Pair
-Ornithoptera Arruana Pair
-Ornithoptera Teucrus Pair
-Ornithoptera Rothschildi Pair

Bas

[Adam Cotton]

arruana and teucrus both belong to Ornithoptera priamus, variously regarded either as separate subspecies or as local forms of ssp. poseidon.

Note that species or subspecies names should start with a small letter, only genus names start with a capital.

Adam.

[bas]

thank you Adam I hope they are as remarkable as I expect them to be but it will be another 10 weeks befor I have them in my collection I think anyway what does most collectors do are they catching them there self or are they breeding them buying them from websites as I did too or what is the most efficient way to collect the specimen you want to have ?

[Adam Cotton]

Most of the Ornithoptera sold out of Indonesia are ex pupa. The local collectors rear the larvae or collect wild pupae and hatch them out.

Adam.

[Adam Cotton]

Oh, I forgot to answer the part of your question about buying them because I don't know the answer - I don't buy birdwings myself. They're overpriced and listed on CITES purely because they are large and spectacularly coloured. There is so much literature about them I don't see the point in buying them myself, I'd rather spend the money on some unusual Papilio or Graphium species. Mind you, if they weren't on CITES and the price was realistic compared to their rarity I might buy some.

Adam.

[papilio28570]

Well, with 10 weeks of waiting, you can make some larger setting boards for the females.

[bas]

Well I like them but Im more of a stamp collector I dont give much about the science behind it and if I collect some birdwings , some saturniids and maybe some papillio Machaon species I think it would be very nice

[wollastoni]

So original !...

Agree with Adam.
+ even if you make a "stamp collection" as you said, it will be funnier to collect harder to find lep... and more useful to science.

I guess most of us starts as "stamp collectors" as you said. But with time, by practicing, we all become more and more "entomologists".

So of course keep on collecting those big common Ornitho if you love them, but try also to make a more specialised collection (let's say Lycaenidae for example), you will see you will soon prefer your little blues from the Alpes than your big Ornitho from Papua !

[bas]

Yes I think thats very truth indeed a collection has to evolve and as you gain more knowledge and see more and more one will create a certain taste maybe I write a book about it on the origin of collectors by natural development haha as far as I can tell now I like saturniids a lot specially Athletes and copiopteryx specimens ,actias specimens very colorfull but in a restraint fashion and I like the colorfull contrasts of birdwings and it is I think very standart and not to be missed in a butterfly collection. I noticed its a very attractive and also an adictive hobby dont you agree?

[wollastoni]

oh yes I agree. It's a hard addiction.

[bas]

but I think better than drugs smoking alcohol hookers red bulls and so on

[wollastoni]

Well you can do all if that on top of collecting leps...

[bas]

I wish the Leps alone will drain a lot of my resources $ and im not much into drugs anyway hahaha