Silkworms?

[monkeymatches]

I've been trying to use silkworms as a feeder for my adult Panther cham. I've been trying to figure out an efficient strategy to keeping enough to feed just one Cham.

Last week I tried buying 100 mixed size zebra worms and 2 lbs of food, figuring that by the time the large ones were eaten the little one would be grown (I ended up only getting a bunch of small 1/4" - 1" worms but thats another story). I thought perhaps I could even start a breeding cycle going and just keep a small colony of them.

Today I've got about 20 still alive, they've been dying off at a steady pace since they showed up. I've been following the directions I found on the "Silkworms 101" posting here and on various websites, but I can't imagine that these things are that sensitive. Does it sound like I have a diseased batch? Is this kind of mortality rate common?

Also, does anyone have any good suggestions for keeping silkworms for just one Cham?

T.I.A.

 

[jannb]

Are you keeping them clean and pulling out the little webs daily? Try ordering a smaller amount next time. 100 is allot for 1 cham. Jann

 

[CleanLineChameleons]

The biggest thing I found to work is to keep new Saran wrap pressed against the food within a Glad container that has the top on. A lot of times the food grows bacteria if there is a lot of condensation within the Glad container. IMHO cleaning out the frass is not as important as keeping the food properly stored. I have seen silkies grow to jumbos walking over their webs and frass (I know it sounds weird but that is generally what they do in their webs on a tree).

Chris

 

[dodolah]

if you clean it daily and they kept dying regardless, they could be infected already.
Do you maintain throwing away the one silkie that leaves milky trail?
1 is enough to infect the whole batch.

Silkworms (Bombyx Mori) is one of the oldest domesticated insects (I believe about 5000 years ago).
They do not occur nor they can survive in the wild.
They are the result of selective breeding by human.

That is one of the reason why they are extremely fragile compared to other insects.

 

[sandrachameleon]

Make sure they are not kept in a damp container or overly humidty location.

I had die-offs when I kept a lid on the silkworm containers. Now I dont use lids (they dont go anywhere if there is food they stay near the food) and I dont have many die at all. I also use papertowel on the bottom of the plastic containers, which helps absorb extra moisture.

Dont cook up more food than you need for a week (two weeks max), and keep the food in a closed container.

Move them to fresh clean containers ever week or two, or at least shake out most of the poop.

I buy 200eggs, and find I get about 160 into the chameleons. So if you're doing all the right things, its quite possible you got a bad batch of worms.

This is unlikely to be your problem, but in case it helps anyone else: Dont try to switch from real mulberry leaves to the powdered chow - I found half of them wouldnt switch and thus had a big problem one Fall. They WILL switch from cooked chow to leaves though.

 

[dodolah]

if you have ample supply of mulberry leaves, then i'll opt using the real leaves instead of chow.
I found that i have significantly less fatalities using mulberry leaves.

 

[JoshCrane1]

100 silkies is a bit much for 1 cham. i go through 100 in about 2 1/2 weeks with 2 chams.

i found that if you feed them less chow they wont grow as quickly. i had one worm that went over 3 days without food. just a tip on slowing down growth, feed less food or feed less often.

 

[Ryan Jarosek]

if you have ample supply of mulberry leaves, then i'll opt using the real leaves instead of chow.
I found that i have significantly less fatalities using mulberry leaves.

I doubt there are any Mulberry leaves in NY this time of year, but I do agree with the idea. I can get 300 or so silkies to last a bout 3 weeks on leaves and they are not full grown even after the three weeks.