Comments on: Monarch Caterpillar Disaster

By: texdr

texdr — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:05:51 +0000

I thought it was pretty difficult to feed Monarchs a synthetic food? Maybe they have some secret recipe

By: Valerie

Valerie — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 21:21:33 +0000

Monarch Watch just updated their Facebook site in regard to the baby food containers. They raise the caterpillars in there only. After pupating, they move the chrysalises to an emerging chamber that has room for them to expand their wings. They are feeding the caterpillars an artificial diet of their own making. Hm, wonder what the recipe is . . .

By: Valerie

Valerie — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 21:05:18 +0000

I’m voting you’ve been hit with Oe. Flies would have produced at least 1 pupa per caterpillar. I’ve lost over a dozen this year to flies (a tachnid fly got in the house — the cats let me down) and most of them became chysalises first. Could be a virus too. This year I’ve lost many caterpillars with the similar symptoms to yours. The ones from those containers that became butterflies were very weak, had split proboscises and showed Oe under the microscope. I’m not seeing alot of spores, but the effects are devasting. Been doing alot of bleaching. Monarch Watch just posted a Tweet that says they are looking for plastic baby food containers. One container is big enough to house 1 caterpillar. They say it’s working great. Looks like they are feeding some type of synthetic or prepared milkweed, though. http://twitter.com/monarchwatch