Sometimes we raise Oleander Moths at MOSI in the cooler months just to have something to display. The caterpillars are somewhat similar to Gulf Fritillaries so I like to educate people on the difference.
I was cleaning out the Pipevine ST tank today and did a good deed. One of my caterpillars was laying on the bottom of the cage kind of on his side. I picked him up and could see that he was about to molt. But he wasn't stuck to any silk! (This is bad.) I found a part of the tank on the side where another caterpillar had really silked up a good patch and I stuck my caterpillar to it in hopes he would stay there. It took a couple tries, but he did! A few hours later, he molted and he's looking good. As for my census, I have somehow dropped from 11 Pipevine cats to 8. I saw number 9 dead in the bottom but I wonder where the other two went. Then again, I don't want to think too hard about that. For Swallowtails, Pipevines sure have a bad survival rate. Remember all those eggs I had? And I'm down to 8 cats. Still better than none!
Hopefully, I'll have some awesome pictures from the museum tomorrow. I think I'm going to take my Spicebush cat as a demonstrator - but he's definitely coming back home with me! Everyone likes Spicebush cats - they're too cute!
