Reanimating Hornworms (new pics - Pupae!)

[invictusrules]

Thanks for the WalMart tip! I went around sniffing tomato plants for the stinkiest foliage. Ended up with Golden Jubilee and Bradley. (Couldn't resist the banana peppers, either.) Maybe eggs in a few days!

 

[blondie098]

Here is our "Manduca Project" rearing box for the moths ~ picky, picky, I hope the tomato plant is stinky enough to please the little princesses! We peeked, and it appears we have 3 boys, 3 girls in pupae stage!!! Not hatched yet, but we're all ready... The moths live approx 1 week lifestage we think... we're expecting 2 hatching any time, so more pics to come!

 

[invictusrules]

Waaaay too cute! I love the box - looks like a little house all ready for families to move in.

One caution, though, and it's a biggie. Your moths need a vertical surface to crawl up on as soon as they emerge. If they can't climb up, their wings will not expand in the minutes/hours after emergence. I learned this the hard way when some of my first moths couldn't scale the Solo cups they were in. Their wings stayed curled up, and they couldn't fly at all. Just skittered around on the floor looking really pathetic.

A paper towel pinned/taped to the wall with the lower end inside the "beds" will do the trick. The moths will find the paper towel and climb right up as soon as they clear the pupal case.

Here's a cool link with amazing pictures and some great info. (I wish I'd read Toby's story before I let those moths get deformed...)
http://www.chameleonnews.com/?page=article&id=57

 

[blondie098]

Thanks invictus -- that site, and manducaproject dot com are where we got most of our research from... now it's trial and error! Ewww, I hadn't seen the hatch video yet, they're squirty little buggers, huh? but the video of the wings plumping was way cooool!

Would pipecleaners leaned against the wall and into the container work for them to climb? I could put a bunch of those in there, and no matter where they "land" when they're done freaking out from the hatch, they could invert?

 

[invictusrules]

I guess pipecleaners would work if you could secure them so the moths wouldn't pull them down. Those moths are really heavy and STRONG! (somehow, I get the image of a moth on the end of a pipe cleaner, swaying back and forth like one of those old-fashioned metronomes... :lol: )

Yeah, you'd better watch out for the squirts when the moths come out. I've found red stuff above (!) the cage netting. One of those :dontknow: things that make you go "huh?"

 

[blondie098]

sigh... still waiting for moths to hatch, I feel like an expectant grandparent pacing the maternity ward!

 

[Elora]

wow hornworms are so beautiful. even when they are itty bitty

 

[blondie098]

>>> paces floor, w-a-i-t-i-n-g, getting rather impatient! <<<

The 2 we suspected would hatch first look like their wing-area of the wrapper is "wrinkling" -- not sure if that is normal, but their little abdomens are still twitching when touched, so we know they're alive!

I used the 25-watt standard bulb that was recommended, and my plants are looking a li'l starved for sunlight... may switch the light out, and add screen for ventilation to release heat.

 

[blondie098]

We have our first MOTH -- yay!

Glad I added the pipecleaners -- they are the good quality ones from a smokeshop, not the craft ones that give you fuzzy boogs up your nose... I punched a hole in the side of the box, and just crimped it on the outside.

invictus -- how long do they hang to plump dem wings? the timer light just went out for nitey nite, I don't want to mess with the day/nite schedule. Will he be fluttering around by tomorrow a.m.?

OMG -- I just realized something, ppl -- this was my LITTLEST cacoon that just hatched, and he doubled in length when he unfolded his wings... most of my other pupae are twice his size (pupae length). How big can these puppies get?!?

 

[fresnowitte]

Congratulations!
How cool is that?

BTW the moth gets to be about the size of a hummingbird. :wink:

 

[invictusrules]

YIPPEE!! :headbang:

(Who'd think we could get so excited about moths?)

The wings already look fully pumped in the picture. My guys usually come out in mid-late afternoon and hang around for several hours. Sometimes I get to see them fly (they sound like helicopters) but mostly they fly at night after the lights are out. Once in a while, one will get active during the day, but the rest just ignore the wild child.

They'll sit on your finger during the day when they're resting. I haven't risked messing with them at night. I had one escape, and I don't want to play "chase Mothra through the house" again. (Haha - my leopard gecko thought he was going to eat like a king when he saw that thing hovering over his tank!)

 

[blondie098]

wow, they DO sound like mini helicopters when they fly! and they dive bomb each other... it's SO cool watching them hover and drink the nectar... wow, what a sight!

We got knocked offline for about 3 weeks, so I haven't been able to post -- we've had all our moths hatch, and got non-viable eggs (no male to fertilize at first)... then we finally got about 50+ viable ones at the end of the last girl's life... now that we know what we're doing, we'll do it again next cycle!

Our viable eggs hatched, and are growing now... beardies are looking at 'em like, "is it soup yet ma?"...

We did find the following:
Yes, they are picky about the plant -- if it doesn't have a heavy scent, they won't lay eggs on it.

They tickle when you get them on your finger, but they can fly away fast, so beware if you play with your bugs!

They are picky about how you offer their nectar... we used the prepackaged hummingbird stuff, and used a HB feeder hanging from the top of the habitat... that worked, but we kept thinking to make it better... bought a child's sippycup with a plastic lid, and drilled holes in it...that worked the best! they would rest on the top of the cup, and unwind their straw and just drink-drink-drink...

Their sippy straw noses are REALLY cool! you can see them unfurl it and wind it back up...

We're in caterpillar stage now, so we'll gear up the moth box again in about a month :shock:

 

[invictusrules]

COOL!
How did the moths figure out to find the sugar-water inside the sippy cup? I never see my guys drink. Is it the color of the lid that attracts them, or is there a scent to the sugar solution?

 

[blondie098]

Man, all 4 of us crowded around the box watching them one night at 11:00 -- the curly-Q "nose" extends out, and they taste everything to find the nectar. I am not sure if they smell it, it really has no scent (neither did the sugar water we tried). But they would hover above the plant, and extend their "nose" -- well, did you see Wall-E? The way Eve "searches" with her little blue light for the plant? That's what I kept thinking of! :mrgreen:

Their nose, fully extended, is the length of their body! :shock:

That nose is really amazing, too = they can hover over the nectar, and like a hummingbird, consume the goodies for a long time, then flit off on another adventure.

Laying eggs was cool, too -- I was under the assumption that they laid "lines" of eggs ... nope! the girls would fly around, then squoosh their booty toward the plant, lay 1 egg, then flit off to find another spot... this little dance went on for an hour before they had to rest. Needless to say, harvesting eggs was not an easy task, it was like an easter=egg hunt, only I was searching for teeny-tiny hidden emerald gems!

 

[pscaulkins]

The show boxes work but you have to cut the lid and put screen on it. I hotglued it to the lid. That does contain the hornworms very good. I hatched one batch of hornworm eggs from GreatLakes last year. I found them to be more time consuming. If they run out of food, they eat each other. The cup idea would be perfect. I just wanted to let people know that you can raise them in plastic shoe boxes with screen on the lids and plastic mesh inside.

To bad, hornworm eggs can't be refrigerated so a person could stagger their hatch to have continuous horns.