Hi All,
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone!
Johann van Hendrick has extra cocoons/pupae of the following species
for trade/sale.
Contact him at Johann.
Citheronia splendens
Antheraea oculea
Eacles oslari
Anisota oslari
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Nathan Boob also has some livestock for sale/trade and he writes, "I've been trying to find some E. calleta stock from Arizona, preferably diapausing cocoons. I'd like to trade cocoons. I'd also be interested in ova for next year if cocoons are not avaiable. I thought you might know of someone out there that would have cocoons now or ova next year. Contact Nathan at Nathan Boob
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Livestock available in Canada is limited now to only Antheraea polyphemus. Everything else is sold out here in Canada.
For U.S. and overseas shipping, the following species are still
available from U.S. shipping location (New Hampshire) at membership prices
(adjusted up due to devalued U.S. dollar)
listed below:
Actias luna, Automeris io, Callosamia promethea at $4.25 U.S./cocoon;
Antheraea polyphemus at $4.50;
Hyalophora cecropia and Hyalophora columbia at $6.25;
Eacles imperialis imperialis at $8.00/pupa;
Citheronia regalis at $16.00/pair or $8.00/pupa for single males.
Butterflies:
Papilio glaucus (Eastern Tiger Swallowtail) and
Papilio troilus
(Spicebush Swallowtail) at $4.25.
Eurytides marcellus (Zebra Swallowtail) and Papilio asterius
(Black Swallowtail)at $4.50.
Shipping and handling within U.S. is $8.00. It will be slightly higher for overseas shipping.
I am looking to purchase in bulk at wholesale prices healthy, good-sized, overwintering cocoons/pupae/chrysalids of any or all of the following: Callosamia promethea, Callosamia angulifera, additional Hyalophora cecropia, Eacles imperialis, or any other North American Saturniidae or butterfly pupae. They can be shipped to a U.S. destination. Check the newsletter pages regularly as I will provide notices of any new items in the newsletters.
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I have begun to create the "Leroy Simon Collection" which is now linked from the main page of the WLSS.
Fifteen species are linked as of November 12. I have hundreds more images to post and Leroy has indicated he will be sending another CD soon.
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Yeray Monasterio Leon has sent a pdf file (very large one) showing all instars of Actias chapae. The file is linked from the A. chapae file.
Apparently this species is single brooded in its natural habitat (mountains of southern China and northern Vietnam), and the eggs usually do not emerge until after they have endured several weeks of cooler weather (diapausing egg stage).
Yeray has also sent very nice images (larvae adn adults) of Actias sinensis subaurea.
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Rainer Plontke has sent a series of images of Antherina suraka, Actias selene and Actias gnoma from his rearings.
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Jean-Louis Albert of Franceville, Gabon, has sent very nice images of recto and verso spread Nudaurelia alopia male and Imbrasia obscura female, linked from the respective species pages. Dates and wingspans also provided.
Jean-Louis has also sent images of Imbrasia truncata, Lobobunaea acetes with data.
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Mike Buczkowski has sent a report an image of a Ceranchia apollina pairing, early afternoon, November 25.
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Weiwei Zhang has sent images of live and spread male and female Rhodinia rudloffi from China. Contact Weiwei for livestock via link on credits page.
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Kelly Price has sent images of spread male and female Automeris postalbida from Limon, Costa Rica, and female Automeris excreta from Oaxaca, Mexico.
Kelly also sends images of Copaxa rufinans, Copaxa multifenestrata, Arsenura polyodonta, Copiopteryx semiramis banghaasi, Caio championi, Archaeoattacus edwardsii, Antheraea helferi borneensis, Antheraea larissa ridlyi, Antheraea platessa, Loepa oberthuri.
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Teemu Klemetti has sent images of spread males (light and dark forms) of Antistathmoptera daltonae granti from a town near Morogoro, Tanzania. Males had not been previously depicted on WLSS.
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Earlier this fall, I had an interesting experience with two Antheraea polyphemus and one Actias luna cocoon. I use very large sleeves (12 feet long with almost 12 foot circumference) for rearing these two species. Frequently the larvae will leave the foliage and spin up againgst the sleeve material.
When I remove the sleeves from the trees, I try to do a thorough inspection, but occasionally miss a few cocoons.
The used sleeves are brought in with the cocoons, and the sleeves usually sit in a big pile outside on the ground until I can give them a good cleaning (delicate 14 minute cycle in cold water/javex (chlorox) in washing machine and then hang them on a clothesline to dry in the sun.
While I was gathering up the sleeves to bring them in for washing, I found a couple of cocoons that I had missed on the first inspection, but I also apparently missed a few cocoons on this second inspection. I found them after removing the sleeves from the washing machine after a full fourteen minute wash cycle, spin cycle and rinse cycle. These cocoons had been fully immersed in a mild bleach solution. To my surprise both polyphemus cocoons had pupae that wiggled when the cocoons were shaken. I separated those cocoons and rechecked them just the other day. The pupae were still wiggling when disturbed. I have put them into cold storage and will see if they produce healthy adults next spring.
A luna cocoon that also went through the wash contained a pupa that wiggled when I gently pressed on sides of the cocoon. It was also wiggling as of last inspection and has also gone into storage.
Neither of the cocoons dipslayed any sogginess, and I doubt that any of the water penetrated the polyphemus cocoons.
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Sphingidae Express
Non-member Tony Kingston of England writes, "I collect worldwide Sphingidae, but really specialise in the African species. As a bit of background, I worked in the tobacco industry for thirty two years and was posted to India and Sri Lanka for ten years or so and then to Tanzania and Malawi the last twenty two years, until I was made redundant last year. I did quite a bit of collecting in Africa and I do have a small African Saturniidae collection myself, but am specialising in Sphingidae from now on. I discovered a new species (and a new genus!) of sphingid in Tanzania in the nineties and that spurred on my interest in this family (now called Viriclanis kingstoni). I would be very interested to hear if any of your members had any sphingids available for sale.
Tony can be reached via email at Tony Kingston.
Jim Tuttle has advised me that his new book The Hawk Moths of North America is going to be released sometime this year. There is a discount for advance sale purchases. Info can be had at Introductory Offer. There might still be time to order this book at the reduced rate!
I continue to receive Sphingidae images from the southern states and have been creating adult thumbnail as well as larval thumbnail checklists for many U.S. counties/parishes.
See Coleoptera section below for additional comments on Sphingidae.
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Arctiidae Art
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Catocala Capers
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Caterpillars Too!, a North American butterfly website:
I will also be relocating this website as it was on the webspace previously provided by Clive Pratt.
I hope to have all members notified of that change by early November.
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A new Coleoptera (Beetles) page is being created.
This page will be resricted to those members of WLSS who have an interest in Coleoptera (Beetles) and who are willing to have their email addresses posted there for correspondence, limited to the Coleoptera family.
This list will not be available through any search engines and will not be linked by me from any of my websites. Instead, those members who register (no charge) will be directed to an unlisted URL.
Members whose names appear on this list have agreed to use the contact information solely for the purpose of furthering their interests in Coleoptera.
Members have also agreed that they will neither post this list/page nor divulge its contents nor share its contents with others.
To have your name and email contact information posted on the Coleoptera page, send email to Bill Oehlke, indicating you agree to terms above.
N.B. This is note a Coleoptera site, just a listing of contact info for WLSS members with an interest in Coleoptera.
There are also quite a few members interested in Sphingidae, so I will post special Sphingidae page under same conditions. I am also considering an African Sphingidae section if there is sufficient interest and those who can supply high quality images.
A Catocala page will also be posted.
If you wish to have your name, location, interests and email posted on the Coleoptera, Sphingidae or Catocala contacts page, please let me know.
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All Leps Barcode of Life
The All Leps Barcode of Life project is providing much data for
worldwide distributions of Saturniidae and Sphingidae species as well as
for species of other lepidopteran families. The project should also
greatly help with classification of specimens through DNA analysis.
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