Post by nightwings on Nov 29, 2017 12:04:31 GMT -8
This summer I returned to SE Arizona to collect and rear for the first time in three years after collecting there since 1990. One of my goals had been to rear H. tricolor but I had never collected females or larvae previously. I had seen many males and old egg rings in past years and I did find one larvae at Patagonia Lake a number of years ago. This summer all of this changed during one of my frequent walks with my dogs and wife along the frontage road near Amado, AZ. Always keeping my eyes peeled for sign of saturniids, I was rewarded by finding a decent sized colony of third instar (as far as I could guess) tricolor larvae on a small sweet acacia, A. farnesiana bush. Further searching revealed more and larger larvae on nearby acacia. As time passed I discovered many more larvae on the mesquite and acacia along the roadside. I was able to switch most to feeding on the mesquite which was much easier to harvest and handle than the acacia. Eventually I needed to return to Mexico so I decided to send the pupated larvae and prepupae to a friend to watch over the winter since I would not have been able to bring them back into the US if I took them south with me. To our surprise, beginning in early November through the 22nd, the adults began to emerge. quite a bit sooner than the normal dates in Marchl. We assumed that this may have been an artifact of being reared in unnatural surroundings. Now I am beginning to think that maybe there may be more to this odd event. This week, while returning to Arizona I stopped just south of Santa Anna, Sonora at a gas station/mini-mart and made a surprising discovery. It was a freshly killed female Hemileuca tricolor on the sidewalk. There were no more in the surrounding area on walls near lights but it was late morning by then. So, I am wondering if anyone else has seen evidence of an early emergence time? Could they be like the Hemileuca eglanterina annulata which I studied in Wyoming decades ago? They would pupate in June with some emerging in late July into early August and most of the rest emerging the next summer. Maybe it is a survival strategy to ensure some ova are laid over a longer period of time, depending upon the weather. This has gone on long enough so I will end here and await input from the Hemileuca fans.
