Silkworm food...?

[Twitchet]

Hi Remkon, that sounds great- glad it worked out for you- I looked at postage costs and that is exactly what it will cost him to post- postage these days is so expensive, If he didn't do international I was going to suggest next time I bought some I posted some to you from here.
The question is- where have you hidden the secret silkworm stash? you said you'd need to hide it from eyes.

 

[Remkon]

Hi Remkon, that sounds great- glad it worked out for you- I looked at postage costs and that is exactly what it will cost him to post- postage these days is so expensive, If he didn't do international I was going to suggest next time I bought some I posted some to you from here.
The question is- where have you hidden the secret silkworm stash? you said you'd need to hide it from eyes.

That would have been great! For now I still have 400Grams powdered chow so I'll first use that and after I may just buy the leaves and put them in the freezer.

I'm actually not hiding the feeders, after telling my wife I was getting dubia nothing really surprises/shocks her anymore.

 

[Remkon]

So I split up around 12 of the largest silkworms and at least 5 of them are now building their cocoon... I have like 30more that are to big for wurma now and should be big enough soon to build a cocoon too.
Most of my 100 eggs have hatched too so I'm going to need a lot of new chow soon.

Meanwhile Wurma still doesn't care for silkworms, my female ackie doesn't like them because they itch her nose and only my male ackie eats (and tortures) them.

I kinda like taking care of the worms, they grow so fast and I only had 2/100 die on me yet.

I fear I may become a silkworm factory if this keeps up...

 

[Twitchet]

If Wurma doesn't care for them there's only one thing to do- can't see any way around it- you are going to HAVE to get another chamelon to add to your collection who does eat them. No one likes the truth but there you go
Naughty Wurma, I must say with the exception of the male parsons everyone here goes in phases where they will or wont eat a certain food.
Those are big silkworms are super. I've always fed mine off before they get to that stage but would like to have moths, the chams would love them . You have a low rate of die off- I've lost a few lately but nothing too bad. Never tried hatching eggs so I'll give that a go.

 

[Remkon]

I wanted to buy a female Jacksonii and try breeding them but recently I want a Panther chameleon (ambanja or ambilobe) more and more.
Getting a panther would take up the space I have reserved for a female and any offspring.
Odds are there isn't even a real demand for Jacksonii here anyways so I may just put my plans to breed anything on hold for a few years and get that panther.

By the way, I think I will soon order 1 or 2 KG of powdered chow from the UK and just keep this silkworm thing going for a while. It's extremely relaxing to me to take care of them silkworms so I do plan on keeping it going even if I only have 1 reptile eating them, I can sell them off if I get to many...

How about I will send you a bunch of my first eggs?

 

[KapitalJ]

It's extremely relaxing to me to take care of them silkworms so I do plan on keeping it going even if I only have 1 reptile eating them, I can sell them off if I get to many...

I also find it relaxing spending time in my "bug room" (now taking over my workshop)

 

[Twitchet]

I swear I almost spend more time caring for the feeders than I do the chameleons- now got locusts, crickets, silkworms, stick insects, calci worms, dubia , orange head roaches, waxworms, pachnoda beetles.
I do like pet bugs though- had horsehead grasshoppers- so funny to look at, spiny sticks and my wonderful Chinese devil katydid- a predatory cricket- best insect in the world. Had various mantids too, they are great fun.. I am waiting on 7 xylotrupes rhino beetle larvae- they are taking forever to pupate but will be pretty gorgeous if I can get them through to adult.
So Remkon- are you hoping to breed your own moths and produce eggs- crikey- I was just going to be lazy and buy. Next you'll be telling me you are going to start weaving silk scarves.

 

[Remkon]

Well I'm almost out of chow and I still have a lot of silkies so if they are a cocoon or moth they dont need food... I hope i get moths and eggs, it will be fun to experience.
I just ordere 2kg chow, but I don't think it will be here in time so I will feed a lot of silkies to my ackie.

I wanted to breed fruit beetles but I will first have to dispose of my soilbug colony to make space... Soil bugs are easy and good food for your smaller reptiles... You can put a lot of em with your pigmys and they will be a clean up crew.

 

[Twitchet]

Soil bugs- would they be what we call springtails? teeny weeny little white bouncy bugs? I have them in most of my vivs, I keep fruit flies- forgot to mention them- they can have mites that attack springtails so I've lost some and have to replenish colonies. Useful little things though, best colony I have is living with my giant millepede. There's a billion of them.
I had some mecynnorhina beetles emerge, they where great but what a noise when they tried to fly.

 

[Remkon]

It's Sow Bugs, silly me...
I had them for baby wurma but I doubt he will eat em now...
Now I have like 1000, i started with 20... I will release them in my backyard sometime I guess...

I still want to do mantises but 12€ a bug is not cheap and will take a while to become productive.

 

[Twitchet]

Yes- Sow bugs- here in U.k we call the chisly bobs, cheese bugs, chuggy pigs and monkey peas or just woodlice.
I want a chinese mantid ooth and grow some on for the parsons- I hear mantids are a top fav food.
Let me know how the moths get on- I hear they take a couple of weeks to emerge?

 

[Remkon]

3weeks to emerge, then eggs, then 2-3 months in the fridge.
I will keep you posted... Once I'm full circle I may write a caresheet.

 

[Remkon]

I got ~20silkies that are cocooning or are already done...
I can't feed chow to the big guys anymore because I'm almost out so I've split up the group and am feeding half of them dandelion leaves and the others chow.
Any silkie that did not start building a cocoon by tomorrow will become ackie food and the small piece of chow that I still have will be used for the babies.

I hope my chow order comes next week otherwise all babies will die...

It would be awesome if the moths would energy and produce some eggs.... With 300 eggs per female moth that would be a lot of silkies

 

[Twitchet]

I'm ashamed to say but i'm envious ! I want silkworms to be cocooning. Not fair !
I hope the food arrives soon, that would freak me out.
I tried to work out if the next time I ordered chow and I ordered yours as well then posted if it would work out cheaper for us but I can't see how it could- £16 postage to you but theres' postage to me too so dont think it would work favourably. Sorry.
Good luck with the empire- sounds like it's gonna be big. Are you planning to sell excess to other people in your country?

 

[Remkon]

They are even cocooning in my ackies terrarium now.
I can still buy food in the Netherlands but that's more expencive so I prefer feeding off the adults and using what I have for the babies.

I'm not sure what I will do with excess silkies. I've got 2-3months to deside on that once I have eggs.
I will probably equip myself better to raise silkies in the future, maybe it can be fun to raise em for a bit of money.

I mailed a breeder of panther chameleons to see what he has... I need an extra mouth to take care of all feeders I have, my dubia colony also exploded.
I'm looking in to Ambilobe, nosy valiha and possibly nosy mitsio but that's a different breeder.
I can't choose, they are all so pretty.

 

[Remkon]

All out of silkies!!!
43 cocooned, 2stikl buzy... 3/100 dead and the rest got eaten.

My 2kg powdered chow order is also on it's way.

Friday I will start cutting the cocoons since they should be all well done and it will increase the chance of the moth to emerge successfully.

The last 30 worms i had split in 2groups, I fed one group with chow, the other group with dandelion leaves. Both groups ended up cocooning, only 1 death in the dandelion group after 5days... I will test this again in the future and will then try to raise them on dandelion leaves.

 

[Twitchet]

That's amazing- Have you graduated from Silkworm School? How do you know so much about them??
You say you will cut them out the silks,and that helps them not have to make it out themselves- didnt know you could do that- I've never seen a cocoon, they look so beautiful, I will have to make a bigger raising area and keep some on and watch them make their cocoons. Very interesting, thanks for that info and pictures, I'm going to try mine with dandelion.

 

[Remkon]

i dont know the first thing about them... Just following a caresheet and doing it my way anyways..

apparently you cut the cocoon on one side, not the insect of course, and they crawl straight out when ready. Otherwise they can become a victim of their own product.

I'm looking forward to them emerging, if a lot of them do I'll probably scale up and try to make it a staple feeder for all my reptiles next to dubia roaches and crickets.
They are really healthy food, low fat, high in good stuff and have something in them that helps absorb calcium.

 

[KapitalJ]

Every one that I have tried to "cocoon" died on me...

I have never heard of anyone cutting it open for them. This will allow the weak to survive, But only the strong are supposed to survive!!

 

[Remkon]

Every one that I have tried to "cocoon" died on me...

I have never heard of anyone cutting it open for them. This will allow the weak to survive, But only the strong are supposed to survive!!

they are food so they should all live!
i don't do anything special, i dont even work with disinfectant's or w/e, just water...
Maybe they are sensitive to soap and disinfectants?

I also split up the groups so they don't have to fight over food.

I think I use a little more water on my chow too since my chow doesn't get very hard. i dont microwave it, i just add boiling water to the chow and mix it up until its as thick as clay, then let it cool down and put it in foil in the fridge.