Posting my silkworm experience

[snitz427]

An interesting experience I thought was worth sharing... @Hashtag ChamLife and I were recently discussing how long we think silkworms could go without food. Not recommending NOT feeding them, but I had experimented a little with how far I can comfortably go to ensure old food dries out and they move to new food.

Anyway... I took two small silkworms to bribe a cham off the free range, and they weren’t taking the bait. I put the silkworms aside in a bsfl container to feed off later, and then forgot about it. Im not sure how long, but my guess is that I left them in the container with no food for a week. There were two tiny poops in the container when i found them, and they obviously hadn't grown at all, but they were very much alive!

I wouldnt recommend letting new hatches go without food - but these were still on the smaller side and did just fine!

 

[skoram]

An interesting experience I thought was worth sharing... @Hashtag ChamLife and I were recently discussing how long we think silkworms could go without food. Not recommending NOT feeding them, but I had experimented a little with how far I can comfortably go to ensure old food dries out and they move to new food.

Anyway... I took two small silkworms to bribe a cham off the free range, and they weren’t taking the bait. I put the silkworms aside in a bsfl container to feed off later, and then forgot about it. Im not sure how long, but my guess is that I left them in the container with no food for a week. There were two tiny poops in the container when i found them, and they obviously hadn't grown at all, but they were very much alive!

I wouldnt recommend letting new hatches go without food - but these were still on the smaller side and did just fine!

This thread is epic.

 

[Hashtag ChamLife]

I will add that once they get feeding size or better, they don't like to go without food AT ALL. The biggest ones are happy so long as there is constantly food nearby. As soon as that food get scarce - not even depleted - they will begin to spin their cocoon. The smaller size adults, around 2 inches or so, are tolerant of being without food for about 2 days before they start trying to escape or cocoon.

The smaller ones are always busy swapping food for space to molt. They must have a different outlook on resources before becoming monster worms, hehe.

 

[Firewallx]

Hi I am raising silkworms and just had a surprising thing happen today. The majority of mine are in the cocoons, while others are still caterpillars. Four moths had emerged. The first two (male and female) laid their eggs on the 12th of July. I was waiting for those eggs to turn dark before putting them in the fridge, like the last time, however, the eggs are still pale and one actually hatched. So now I have a Kego from a five day old, non-refridgerated egg. How is this possible? The eggs didn't darken. The previous generation went as expected, so what is going on?

 

[Beman]

Hi I am raising silkworms and just had a surprising thing happen today. The majority of mine are in the cocoons, while others are still caterpillars. Four moths had emerged. The first two (male and female) laid their eggs on the 12th of July. I was waiting for those eggs to turn dark before putting them in the fridge, like the last time, however, the eggs are still pale and one actually hatched. So now I have a Kego from a five day old, non-refridgerated egg. How is this possible? The eggs didn't darken. The previous generation went as expected, so what is going on?

Sooooo apparently this can happen. Someone else just told me about this with her eggs. laid and then after 9 days they hatched??? crazy. @Spyro might know what is up.

 

[snitz427]

Hi I am raising silkworms and just had a surprising thing happen today. The majority of mine are in the cocoons, while others are still caterpillars. Four moths had emerged. The first two (male and female) laid their eggs on the 12th of July. I was waiting for those eggs to turn dark before putting them in the fridge, like the last time, however, the eggs are still pale and one actually hatched. So now I have a Kego from a five day old, non-refridgerated egg. How is this possible? The eggs didn't darken. The previous generation went as expected, so what is going on?

They can hatch without refrigeration if conditions are just right. I’ve had a batch hatch while others laid around same time did not (without refrigeration).

I have no idea on the color. You can usually tell when they are about to hatch because you can make out the little tiny kego in the egg (like day before/day of). I always assumed yellow=unfertile.

 

[snitz427]

I will add that once they get feeding size or better, they don't like to go without food AT ALL. The biggest ones are happy so long as there is constantly food nearby. As soon as that food get scarce - not even depleted - they will begin to spin their cocoon. The smaller size adults, around 2 inches or so, are tolerant of being without food for about 2 days before they start trying to escape or cocoon.

The smaller ones are always busy swapping food for space to molt. They must have a different outlook on resources before becoming monster worms, hehe.

I have had them go for well over a week without food and without pupating (accidentally - but they all lived). Once they are just about to pupate...they’ll start cocooning if nothing else to do.

Ive never had one cocoon early or small though, and i intentionally feed sparsely to manage moisture, mold, and size

 

[Spyro]

Sooooo apparently this can happen. Someone else just told me about this with her eggs. laid and then after 9 days they hatched??? crazy. @Spyro might know what is up.

The eggs never went into diapause. Most eggs imported from India are like that. It’s tricky to intentionally do it consistently.

 

[Firewallx]

@Spyro I was shocked because the previous generation did not do this. Those eggs turned black and I put them in the fridge. These eggs are not turning black but some have a black spot (probably the Kego's head) showing. I've read about silkworms that have one brood a year and others that have two, I just assumed these would be the former. I don't know where they originate from since I originally obtained their "grandparents" from a member on this forum. Except for one, who came from a pet store.

 

[Crossingtami]

I bought some fruit / produce netting off amazon. It was a bundle of 100, I think, but I only used a 1/3rd of one for the babies. Its a bit too small to use the whole life cycle... but perfect for the youngn’s that are too fragile to move around.

It is really stretchy so bigger worms could probably get thru, but by then you could bump up to gutter guard or just pick them up.

What a difference a day makes! The babies are 6 days old and already significantly larger than yesterday. The netting technique is great - most transfered up but there are a few stragglers. I’ll wait another day before cleaning out the old food. I only put small pieces down at first, so hopefully it will have dried out.

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Also have 1 coccoon and 2 starting to spin. Not sure what I’m going to do with the poop. I’m worried about disturbing the spinners... but that’s alot of poop generated in just 12 hrs!! Put paper towels down as the liquid they spewed made a mess rolling around the bottom.

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Who would have thought I’d be so excited about raising bugs... but we’ve got quite the growing bug nursery going!

Do you just lay the netting on top of the worms?

 

[snitz427]

Do you just lay the netting on top of the worms?

Yep!

 

[Crossingtami]

Thanks for ur thread. Been reading up all the other threads here too. Expecting my eggs which I ordered from the 'silkworm shop'. Should the pre-made chow be kept in refrigerator or room temp?

 

[snitz427]

Thanks for ur thread. Been reading up all the other threads here too. Expecting my eggs which I ordered from the 'silkworm shop'. Should the pre-made chow be kept in refrigerator or room temp?

Refridgerate - will last a long time! The next day you may need to drain a little excess liquid.