Return to Albany, California, Winter Break 2017-2018: Citheronia regalis

We have returned to Albany, California from Ithaca, New York as per Cornell University's winter closing, giving us a chance to check on our overwintering pupae.

---

After four months in Ithaca, we have finally returned to our permanent residence in Albany, California where we still have a heap of overwintering pupae. This is the first of several posts that we will be making to update status of each species. 

In early September, we made a brief post indicating that the last of our regal moth (Citheronia regalis) larvae that we reared during the summer had finished pupating that also included a few photographs of prepupal larvae and pupal mass data that we received via email, both courtesy of our mother. But because the pupae were formed during our absence, this is actually the first time that we ourselves are seeing and photographing them; below are new photographs taken today of the thirteen pupae that are now three months old. 

​The sex ratio is oddly skewed with only three of them being female, but at least our hope of breeding a second generation with this stock was quite limited anyway as it is for numerous reasons. The pupae are very hard and fairly stiff; they do not squirm. Although they are glossy, most of the cuticle is actually rough with very distinct separation of segments, especially of the last one, and several odd bumps such as the pair of tough, elevated plates on the thorax. The head and mass of appendages, for some reason, have very little separation between them though. Overall, although they look quite similar to the pupae of the relatively closely related imperial moth (Eacles imperialis), the regal pupae have significantly shorter cremesters and are pitch black rather than dark brown.

While we were away, these pupae were kept in a small plastic tub which, in all honesty, was probably not a very good housing solution for an extended periods of time given climate of the house. Fortunately, all thirteen pupae that were present upon our return appear to be alive (although sixteen data points were previously recorded?). However, before taking the pictures that are shown, they were covered in a few tiny white mites that we can only assume must have been eating away at what dead external material and were not necessarily harming the pupae themselves. Like most pupae, they have a distinctive, somewhat unpleasant, odor to them.

---

Authors
Brian Liang

---