It took us a week of planning and two days of hard work, but we are proud to present to you our home-made katydid rearing and breeding terrarium. Tutorial included! If you have been following our recent Orthoptera posts, you probably know that both of our katydids -- the Mediterranean Katydids (Phaneroptera nana) and Mexican Bush Katydids (Scudderia mexicana) -- are now quickly eclosing into adult now that it is July and breeding them is just around the corner. As a recap, we are now having a huge wave of our ~50 Mediterranean Katydids molting into adult all throughout this week and we already have five Mexican Bush Katydid adults with three others in sixth instar (one away from adult). Of course, there are both males and females adults of each. For months since we have first starting rearing these katydids, we have kept them in very simple and admittedly dreadful glass aquarium tanks indoors. The tanks are not at all large enough to house 50 Mediterranean Katydids and we paid the cost of severe cannibalism; as for the Mexican Bush Katydids which began eclosing into adults earlier, it was clearly not an ideal mating zone or place to fly around (as adults, they have fully developed wings and well suited to fly) and they just seemed very miserable in the tank. On top of the overcrowding and generally lacking in environmental and habitat technicalities, the tank method lacked fresh food (no live plant) and was unsanitary due to the fact that the bottom was sealed and the frass just kept building up. And since the tanks were kept indoors, they had little exposure to sunlight. Katydids, like all insects, are cold-blooded and habitually bask themselves in sunlight during the day (they are nocturnal) in order to maintain optimal health. Today, we finally completed making our new enclosures to solve these problems, encourage breeding, and generally improve their quality of living. Basically, the enclosures are large boxes (2 feet x 2 feet base with one having a height of 4 feet and the other 3 feet) with window screening covering all faces to provide ventilation, sunlight, and visual acuteness. The bottom is open to allow frass to exit the enclosure. Inside of it, we put a live potted plant (Blue Morning Glory [Ipomoea acuminata] and Passionflower [Passiflora mixta x manicata "Susan Brigham"]) to not only provide a fresh supply of fresh foliage but also to allow us to place the entire enclosure outside. So now that you've seen it, without further ado, the following is a little tutorial on how to make one of these home-made katydid terrariums yourself (it is also great for other insects too, of course!): Liang's Home-made Outdoor Rearing Enclosure Tutorial Set up time: 2-3 hours. (Worth the time? Yes!) Materials (Worth the money? Yes!!):
Immediately after we put the Mexican Bush Katydids in, they started to eat voraciously despite them typically feeding nocturnally. We think that they were near starvation in the indoor tank since the flower and leaf cuttings are so dry and undesirable! They also started basking in the sun, literally lying down (horizontally) to increase the amount of surface area exposed to the light; they must have been extremely sunlight deprived in the indoor tank. - Brian
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Timeline 2012–2017
Albany, California This timeline is a series of daily posts recording our observations on and experiences with various insects in Albany California and surrounding areas, from 2012-2017. Since we did not publish this site until 2016, posts before that were constructed retroactively. Starting in August 2017, we moved to Ithaca, New York; posts from there on can be viewed at Timeline 2017-present: Ithaca, New York. Archives (1,011)
August 2017 (49) July 2017 (121) June 2017 (79) May 2017 (77) April 2017 (91) March 2017 (35) February 2017 (12) January 2017 (10) December 2016 (12) November 2016 (26) October 2016 (49) September 2016 (84) August 2016 (94) July 2016 (99) June 2016 (53) May 2016 (21) April 2016 (4) January 2016 (1) August 2015 (3) July 2015 (3) June 2015 (2) June 2014 (3) May 2014 (1) April 2014 (3) March 2014 (3) December 2013 (2) November 2013 (2) October 2013 (5) September 2013 (11) August 2013 (15) July 2013 (9) June 2013 (5) May 2013 (4) April 2013 (3) March 2013 (2) February 2013 (3) January 2013 (2) December 2012 (2) November 2012 (1) October 2012 (2) September 2012 (2) August 2012 (5) July 2012 (1) June 2012 (1) Authors
![]() ![]() Full Species List (Alphabetical by scientific name) Note: - Not every species we encounter is necessarily presented on this site, rather a selection of those that were of particular interest to us and that we felt were worth documenting. - We can't guarantee that all species have been identified accurately, particularly taxa we are not as familiar with. Lepidoptera Actias luna Adelpha californica Agraulis vanillae Allancastria cerisyi Antheraea mylitta Antheraea polyphemus Anthocharis sara Argema mimosae Attacus atlas Battus philenor hirsuta Bombyx mori Caligo atreus Callosamia promethea Coenonympha tullia california Citheronia regalis Cricula trifenestrata Danaus plexippus Eacles imperialis Erynnis tristis Estigmene acrea Eumorpha achemon Eupackardia calleta Furcula cinereoides Heliconius erato Heliconius hecale Heliconius sapho Heliconius sara Hyalophora cecropia Hyalophora columbia Hyalophora euryalus Hylephila phyleus Hyles lineata Junonia coenia Langia zenzeroides formosana Lophocampa maculata Manduca sexta Morpho peleides Nymphalis antiopa Orgyia vetusta Orthosia hibisci quenquefasciata Pachysphinx modesta Papilio cresphontes Papilio eurymedon Papilio glaucus Papilio machaon oregonius Papilio multicaudata Papilio polyxenes asterius Papilio rumiko Papilio rutulus Papilio zelicaon Phyciodes mylitta Phyciodes pulchella Pieris rapae Plejebus acmon Poanes melane Polites sabuleti Polygonia satyrus Pyrgus communis Rothschildia jacobaeae Samia cynthia advena Samia ricini Smerinthus cerisyi Smerinthus ophthalmica Strymon melinus Trichoplusia ni Uresephita reversalis Vanessa annabella Vanessa atalanta Vanessa cardui Unidentified Lepidoptera Hybrids Papilio glaucus × Papilio rutulus Papilio polyxenes asterius × Papilio zelicaon Orthoptera Melanoplus devastator Phaneroptera nana Pristoceuthophilus pacificus Scudderia mexicana Trimerotropis pallidipennis Phasmatodea Carausius morosus Phyllium giganteum Mantodea Mantis religiosa Phyllocrania paradoxa Hymenoptera Apis mellifera Bombus vosnesenskii Brachymeria ovata Linepithema humile Pediobius sp. Polistes dominula Xylocopa varipuncta Unidentified Diptera Lucilia sericata Unidentified Hemiptera Brochymena sp. Leptoglossus sp. Nezara viridula Odonata Argia vivida Libellula croceipennis Coleoptera Coccinella septempunctata Cycloneda polita Diabrotica undecimpunctata Hippodamia convergens Araneae (Class: Arachnida) Araneus diadematus Phidippus johnsoni |