Finally!! GST's!

Holy Moly! I've been trying to get GST's for a while...and I finally did! I was walking my new puppy (eng. bulldog, Tulip 8wks) this morning and I checked all of my plants in my "Host Haven". I've had to enclose all of them inside of a separate area because the deer really like to eat them. Well! I went over to have a look at the Biscayne Prickly Ash (Zanthoxylum coriaceum) and there were two eggs-popped open with the beautiful little "poopy" cats just sitting there! I was beside myself! I had to knock on my daughters window so she could come out while I got them off the tree because I was scared to let them out of my sight! Hee, Hee! I'll keep everyone posted! :)

Oh Adrienne!! I am so thrilled for you/with you!!! What a wonderful thing! Neat pic of the little dog! I will watch along hallily as things develop!! I am beside you, beside yourself LOL!

YAAAAAAAY!

:-Deb

Adrienne - My lone cat finally morphed into a chrysalis. It doesn't seem that big for a GST, but here it is in it's final instar.

This message was edited May 26, 2007 8:16 PM

Here's how it looks in it's chrysalis. Definitely swallowtail-looking chrysalis!

Wow how time flies! Seems like yesterday Becky's baby orange dog looked much like yours Adrienne. I was trying to calculate the time GST's spend as cats.. What do you think Becky? & Do we count from today for your GST chrysalis ^ to eclosing?

Deb - Yeppers! It totally eclosed today. So what... 10 days, maybe? I'll be interested to see how long it takes. Raising this one is a first for me, so I don't know for sure what to expect. Looking at the chrysalis, I can see where it would blend right in with the branches on the citrus trees. Sneaky little devils! :-) I can't wait to see how big of a butterfly it is. It sure looks small to me as a chrysalis.

Becky~ I was thinking to add the time from before it was visible too.. Maybe as many as 5 days. That's still a very short time for a cat to mature to pupation. Maybe it's quicker in FL also. Hopefully I will soon get a TX comparison.


:-D

We shall see. :-)

Deb - I started the other thread about my cat on May 1. So that means that it took the GST cat from newly emerged baby cat to chrysalis about 26 days! Wow!!! That's a record for any cat that I have raised! Very interesting, indeed!

This message was edited May 26, 2007 10:10 PM

Almost one phase of the moon, Yes! Very good information Becky.. (I remember noting that somewhere now. May 1) I think BSTs take about 3 weeks, PVST are just a tad longer. Not sure if you saw yet, but I have TST eggs also...2 of them! :-bigsmiles).
Now we can watch along with Adrienne.:-D for her GST,,

My daughter Daisy found another baby this morning! Yippee!
Thanks for the "days" info Girls...its good to know. Deb- I got some Oasis per your instructions and I'm giving it a go. Hope it's ok!

~Adrienne

Hi Adrienne! Way to go Daisy!
I was holding my breath for the TST cat to hatch and finally got a female GST in the garden... She fluttered all around the Lemon tree, and then went to the Hercules. I only found one egg so far.. I will have to get Ben to look for more of them..She oviposited right on the lemon. Definatly going to relocate this egg. I have the other hosts to move them to .for that reason.. The lemons on this tree are really good..juicy and kinda sweet.

:-Deb

Well...sad/weird news. All of my GST babies just sort of dried up. I have no idea what happened. 3 of them were on a Prickly Ash and 1 was on Wild Lime.It's so devastating when it's the "first time" for that species and they don't make it. Any thoughts on why they shriveled up? I'd had them in the floral foam....now could that have made them sick? Should I have covered it so the cat's didn't come into contact with it? Argh!!

~Adrienne

Aw Adrienne, What a bummer! I think the same happened to my (one and only), TST... I will have to break the same news on the thread I just started... Shoot! We will ust have to keep trying.
When I've used floral foam, I put the foam in a sealed baggie taped around the neck of the host plant. And here with the TST I thought I was doing everything I could, but something went terribly wrong...:- Waaaaaa!

Sorry about the little ones, guys! Spiders, maybe? They can suck them (the little ones dry). If you've got them in a cage or something, check the foliage you bring in. But realisticly, caterpillars have all kinds of problems. Could be any number of things we don't even know about...I lose cats and often don't know what happened. Lost a couple of the BST cats this week...who knows?

This message was edited May 31, 2007 2:37 PM

Hey Adrienne and all! It was a false alarm! S/he is alive, just taking a wee napper... The egg shell is definatly enough food for them to last a whole 24 hours without needing to eat. This way if the mom oviposits on anything besides the host, they will survive the trek to find it. Guess s/he knew that wouldn't be necessary since it was right under it's feet. I had myself prepared for the worst. So happy to be wrong here, LOL! Am I a nervous mommy or what??

http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/729153/

:-Deb

Yeppers! These guys are so weird during their different instars. Several times they looked like they had failure to thrive. I figured they were dying. But the one made it. Probably all 3 of them would have if I had separated them from the beginning. Just keep giving your little fella fresh leaves and plenty of time! :-)