Silkworms

[Remkon]

A week is way to short and I don't think it will work well.
People have tried reducing the colder periods and even tried to go without but it did not give good results (or any at all).
Best success is at 2-3months, I had nearly all eggs hatch doing so, you may be able to go little shorter but it will effect the amount of eggs that will hatch.

 

[Dave85731]

So what should I do lol or what would you do.. should I just refrigerate them all for a while

 

[Remkon]

I'm probably less confident that leaving em out after a week of refrigerating will get them to hatch (otherwise you would have had babies by now) compared to refrigerating them again for a month or 2 after being out for a week.

Then again I never been in this situation before so any answer I give is a gamble as well based on my gut feeling.

 

[Dave85731]

I guess I'll try to refrigerate and see what happens I mean either way nothing is hatching so it's kinda like a experiment at this point... so one month or two lol?

 

[Remkon]

Id go with 2

 

[Dave85731]

Ok cool I'll let you know what happens in two months actually one month I've already had half of them in the fridge for almost a month already so I'll try them first lol

 

[Dave85731]

@Remkon hey I pulled some eggs out as a test run and they hatched but how long can eggs stay in the fridge before going bad/die

 

[Remkon]

@Remkon hey I pulled some eggs out as a test run and they hatched but how long can eggs stay in the fridge before going bad/die

Id noteave em in much longer than 3 months. I haven't tried longer tho.

 

[Dave85731]

Oh ok looks like I got 500 to hatch then lol thanks man

 

[Remkon]

Oh ok looks like I got 500 to hatch then lol thanks man

500 isn't that much.
Quite a few hatchlings will likely die and odds are your chameleon will be crazy about em.

I'd try to seperate around 25 silks seperate if you plan ti breed more.

 

[Dave85731]

Oh ok I’ve never tried to breed them but thanks for the heads up I’ll give it a shot I ordered 1/2 lb of chow from coastal not sure how long it’ll last it’s getting cold here so mulberry trees are pretty useless right now that’s what I normally use in the summer how much chow do you think it’ll take to get them full grown or to even get the 25 to cacoon

 

[Remkon]

So apparently it is possible to hatch them eggs quickly, I got them hatching within 2 weeks after being layed...

Usually I leave the eggs in with the moths for a while untill all moths are done laying eggs so they enter the fridge all at the same time. So now again but I noticed they were already hatching.

My guess is that it's because of the cold nights, I keep em in my chameleons room and temp drops to around 15C, maybe a bit lower with winter nights.

I don't reccomend hatching em like this because it's a pain to remove em from the bin.

 

[Dave85731]

Did you get a bigger hatch rate or would you say it’s the same

 

[Remkon]

As far as I can judge all eggs that were layed at the same time hatched.
I'll see if the rest will also hatch.

 

[Dave85731]

Well if any thing you just got some feeders to raise earlier than expected lol