Would you try this? (bug rearing content)

[d.g.]

There is a gigantic tobacco hornworm on one of my tomato plants. It's going to get COLD tonight, and I'm seriously considering "rescuing" this guy and turning him into a project. We've never raised butterflies or moths that required this much work, though, and I'm not sure if it's worth the effort. He'll need a container with dirt for burrowing into and we'll have to be sure to keep him protected (likely in our garage or the coldest room in our house) until spring. There's only one on my plants (I checked!) so I can't exactly do life-cycle activities with him. On the other hand, the big hawk moths are pretty cool.

 

Right now, the educational/awesomeness value and the inconvenience seem balanced. Anyone want to tip the scales one direction or another? Would *you* take on a project like this last minute?

[Acorn]

I definitely would. It is so fun to watch them eat and grow. I imagine it will pupate soon.

[d.g.]

Ok, even if I don't do this, I just found a great resource here. There's even a basic coloring book in English and Spanish. :D

[Mallory]

Well I wouldn't be able to keep it safe from the fishing trip this weekend. Those things make great catfish bait.

 

But good bait aside, we always have all kinds of creepy crawlies living in tanks and jars at our house, so go for it if you or the kids want to. (The bait usually just makes it to the bait fridge outside).

 

Do you want to hear about the time the 5yo dumped about 50 crawdads in the 10 gallon tank and I started finding them all over the house? Like stepped on in the bathroom or swept out from under beds? I guess 3 to 5 can live in there happily, but when there are that many they start looking for a less crowded place. Huh, who knew?

[kbpaulie]

My opinion, it's just an insect. Do what you can. Teach your kids about life. If need be, teach your kids about death. It can be a whim thing w/o being a major "project".

 

And, also, personally, I think these guys are DISGUSTING!!! :tongue_smilie: We LOVE our monarchs!

 

But go for it and don't make it a huge deal or production.

[d.g.]

Well I wouldn't be able to keep it safe from the fishing trip this weekend. Those things make great catfish bait.

 

But good bait aside, we always have all kinds of creepy crawlies living in tanks and jars at our house, so go for it if you or the kids want to. (The bait usually just makes it to the bait fridge outside).

 

Do you want to hear about the time the 5yo dumped about 50 crawdads in the 10 gallon tank and I started finding them all over the house? Like stepped on in the bathroom or swept out from under beds? I guess 3 to 5 can live in there happily, but when there are that many they start looking for a less crowded place. Huh, who knew?

 

Lol. That's a riot! How long did it take to find them all?

 

Our menagerie used to be a lot like yours sounds, creepy crawlies everywhere, but we've downgraded to 3 cats and our clawed frog. We almost ended up with a lovely black widow earlier this week, but DH told me that only one of them would be going home in our truck, him or the spider, not both. I actually had to think a minute on that one. :D

 

I'm leaning toward doing the project. I already have all the materials on hand to do it, so it's a cheap way to get another interesting life science project in for the year. :)

[Lori D.]

We spontaneously (i.e., not in my schedule) did exactly this project our first year of homeschooling, and it was one of the highlights of the DSs year! You can make a container very easily from a clear plastic food container. Best if it large, and has a wide "mouth" and lid. Poke small holes in the sides with an ice pick (awl, metal skewer, what-have-you) for air (maybe 1-2 dozen), around in a circle, from the middle of the container up to the top), and poke a few holes in the lid. Our boys loved using a big nail and a hammar to make the holes. Take dirt from your garden and put about 3-4 inches worth in the bottom of the container; wedge a fairly sturdy short forked stick at a diagonal angle from the bottom of the container to the side so there is a sturdy place the caterpillar can climb up and down. Every other day or so, clip a branch of tomato plant and prop it up against the stick for the caterpillar to eat.

 

One day you'll notice the caterpillar is "gone" -- it has dug down into the dirt and formed a dark red-brown case for metamorphosis. We gently tipped the container so the dirt slid enough until we could see the case, then gently tipped it back so it was covered again. Several months later, you'll suddenly discover a tan/brown moth in your container. Ta-da!

 

It took maybe 30 minutes to set up the container, and 2 minutes every other day to remove wilted food and put in fresh food. And no work once it was in the pupa stage. We just set the container in a sheltered spot on the back porch and almost forgot about it until we saw the moth!

Edited October 5, 2012 by Lori D.

[d.g.]

We spontaneously (i.e., not in my schedule) did exactly this project our first year of homeschooling, and it was one of the highlights of the DSs year! You can make a container very easily from a clear plastic food container. Best if it large, and has a wide "mouth" and lid. Poke small holes in the sides with an ice pick (awl, metal skewer, what-have-you) for air (maybe 1-2 dozen), around in a circle, from the middle of the container up to the top), and poke a few holes in the lid. Our boys loved using a big nail and a hammar to make the holes. Take dirt from your garden and put about 3-4 inches worth in the bottom of the container; wedge a fairly sturdy short forked stick at a diagonal angle from the bottom of the container to the side so there is a sturdy place the caterpillar can climb up and down. Every other day or so, clip a branch of tomato plant and prop it up against the stick for the caterpillar to eat.

 

One day you'll notice the caterpillar is "gone" -- it has dug down into the dirt and formed a dark red-brown case for metamorphosis. We gently tipped the container so the dirt slid enough until we could see the case, then gently tipped it back so it was covered again. Several months later, you'll suddenly discover a tan/brown moth in your container. Ta-da!

 

 

Thanks for this!

 

I'm actually considering pulling out our plastic critter keeper. It's a little "prettier" to keep around while the caterpillar's still visible, and easy to store once he digs down.

 

Did you release your moth right away?

[d.g.]

My opinion, it's just an insect. Do what you can. Teach your kids about life. If need be, teach your kids about death. It can be a whim thing w/o being a major "project".

 

And, also, personally, I think these guys are DISGUSTING!!! :tongue_smilie: We LOVE our monarchs!

 

But go for it and don't make it a huge deal or production.

 

With this DS, almost *everything* is a project. :tongue_smilie:

 

Monarchs are awesome, but we can't seem to find any wild around our neighborhood, which is how I prefer to catch our creepy crawlies. That way I can release them when we're done with them.

[Lori D.]

Did you release your moth right away?

 

After enjoying looking at him for a few minutes, the DSs decided "caterpillar Jim" needed to be free, so they took the lid off and let him go. :)

[Mallory]

Lol. That's a riot! How long did it take to find them all?

 

Well I stepped on the first one in the bathroom-YUCK- which is on the opposite corner of the house from the fishtank, and I really thought maybe it had just crawled out of a pocket in the pile of dirty clothes in there.

 

Then the next morning I found a couple more in my oldest's bedroom and thought to ask if the ds in question knew anything about any crawdads. Then I got the story about how he caught "a whole jack load, like a zillion and put them in the tank." So we did a crawdad hunt (it's kind of like easter only yuckier) looking under and around things and got most of them, but I'll admit to finding the last couple many weeks later under dd's bed.

[Serenade]

I despise hornworms, so I would happily let him freeze! Or I'd get one of my boys to take care of him. Grrrrrr. I've had so many tomato plants destroyed by those things!

[Serenade]

 

I despise them with every ounce of my being and the only reason I would save it from the cold would be to kill it slowly while I laughed in an evil, "karma's a b^&*(" kind of laugh.

 

Yes, yes, yes!!!! I'm a fellow hornworm hater here.

[Mommie_Jen]

Yes, yes, yes!!!! I'm a fellow hornworm hater here.

 

Me too! I don't mind bug sitting for a few days, but those guys have wrecked my tomatoes this year and I think they are just GROSS. I paid my kids for each one they killed!

[DianeW88]

I am currently the parent of a grasshopper missing both of his jumping legs...thanks to my kittens. He's been thriving happily in his empty fish tank house for the past three weeks. I honestly never thought he'd make it that long, but apparently captivity suits him. :glare: So now my son is studying him for school and working on his Boy Scout Insect badge.

[Mama2Many4]

I'd never seen one of these things so I googled it. My mistake! I couldn't stomach keeping one. I'm such a wimp with insects.

[d.g.]

As if being the only homeschooler in a family and social circle full of teachers and die-hard public schoolers wasn't bad enough, now I *really* feel like a weirdo! :tongue_smilie:

 

I'm a bug person. I've been that way since I first discovered how cool they are back when I was, oh, maybe 4. So, things like this don't phase me. My older DS seems to be taking after me, his little brother not so much.

 

So far in our homeschooling adventure, we've raised: hissing cockroaches, which we only rehomed because they were reproducing too much (since apparently we took too good of care of them); a brown recluse spider that we kept for a few weeks; various isopods that we've hosted for months at a time; butterflies and caterpillars on several different occassions; and crickets and grasshoppers, including a green and black female that was about 4" long! That doesn't count any of the warm-blooded critters that have called our place home in the last several years.

 

As-yet-unnamed hornworm is currently munching a flower on one of the tomato branches I placed in our butterfly habitat. I'll be filling the critter keeper with soil and prepping it for caterpillar comfort later today, before this cold snap really hits us. We might have record lows this weekend, and definitely a freeze, so I won't have to care about my tomatoes being destroyed by hornworms anyway. Not to mention, his buddies (over a dozen and a half of them) hit us about 3-5 weeks ago and stripped the new growth off my heirloom striped zebra tomato... the plant just shrugged it off and put out even more new growth, with is pretty amazing considering how much these guys eat.

[Serenade]

I paid my kids for each one they killed!

 

I have done the same. The first time I see one, I put the kids on hornworm alert. This year we only had one, but we didn't have great tomatoes anyhow, due to the rain. One year I had little hornworms all over the tomatoes. Blech.

[Serenade]

As if being the only homeschooler in a family and social circle full of teachers and die-hard public schoolers wasn't bad enough, now I *really* feel like a weirdo! :tongue_smilie:

 

 

Ah well, we probably all have our things. If it makes you feel better, I'll confess right now that I have a garden spider outside my office window, and I consider her my pet. I have watched her spin her web, capture her pray, and I almost saw her put up her egg sac. I must have missed it by a few minutes, because I thought she disappeared, but then I saw her up there by the newly made egg sac. After she made her egg sac, her size diminished mightily -- she was just a skinny little thing, but now she's putting on weight again! I wonder if they can make two egg sacs per season?

 

Ah well, enough of the spider talk. I just didn't want you to think you were alone. :tongue_smilie:

[Mallory]

I like bugs too, in fact in my alternate life I am an entomologist and I study flower mantises in the amazon.

 

It tends to make me not a very good gardener because I am as excited about the bugs that live there as the plants.

[Hockey Mom]

I actually PAY for hornworms (ordered online). We feed them to our Chameleons. They LOVE hornworms! I've never even thought about raising one to study. Maybe I'll do that with my next batch. :)