Okay, here we go. I have some cats on my passion flower vine. I totally forgot which BF's use this to lay their eggs on. Any help will be greatly appreciated as I am thinking about bringing them in and trying to raise them. They will be my first and I am extremely nervous but want to know what kinds they could be. Please help.
Leslie
Passion vine cats???
Leslie,
Gulf Fritillaries, Julia Longwings, Zebra Longwings and perhaps Mexican Fritillary, Mexican Silverspot and a few other frits and longwings use passion vines as larval hosts.
Post the cat photos if you can so we can ID them for you.
~ Cat
Thanks cat. I will try my best to post some pics but am not very good at it. I know one of them is small and yellowish in color and another looks a little bigger and black and furry. Then there are small green spots all over a bunch of the bloom buds. Not sure if those are more eggs or just part of the plant. I cannot tell. It is too dark now to see anymore. If those are eggs though there are quite a few. And darn it I work all day so I don't get to see what kind of BF's are flying around the plant. Thanks for your help and I will work on getting those photos. May be tomorrow though.
Leslie
Here is the first one to look at, in case you can't get a picture of yours. Most of the suggestions should be in the bug files and have pictures of the caterpillars too. This one does.
http://davesgarden.com/bf/go/9/
Best of luck in your new venture!
Thanks Sheila. So can you tell me by chance what the eggs for these look like? That way I will know if those were eggs I was seeing or just part of the plant. Thanks a lot for all your help.
Leslie
Here's a photo of a Gulf Fritillary egg. Looks like a tiny yellow ear of corn :o)
~ Cat
This is a first instar caterpillar.
~ Cat
This one is a freshly molted second instar...you can see the shell of the old head next to it :o)
~ Cat
After than they pretty much look like this and they just keep getting bigger.
~ Cat
ps...green spots on the plant is probably frass...caterpillar poo :o)
If your caterpillars don't look like the ones of the Gulf frits I've posted perhaps they are julias, zebras or another type of longwing. Do post photos if you can!!!
~ Cat
Great pictures Cat!
How many instars does a Gulf Frit go through? And about how many days from a just hatched cat to chrysalid?
~Lucy
Whoo Hoo, Leslie's got babies! I'm doing the happy dance!
Lucy, someone will answer you soon. You know I don't know. LOL
you guys are so great. I tell ya Cat I have one that looks similar to the first instar but I don't have a magnifying glass or anything and he is pretty small. The second one looks like one I have also but again it is so little I cannot really tell. I hate that I will have to wait until I get home from work to check on them again. I have a really cheap digital camera I can use and that is the only way to get photos on this computer for me. But maybe I can get a fairly good one but I am not getting my hopes up. Anyway, I know there are some holes in my leaves and that is shy I looked and saw what I saw. Could not believe it. The bad thing is my passion vine is not that big. I just planted it about two months ago. It has grown quite a bit in the last month but nothing like some I have seen on here. I only hope they have enough food.
And thanks for the happy dance. That is too funny. I will report back when I get home from work. Thanks again for everything you guys. And yes Cat those are great pics. If I cannot figure it out from those I just don't have much sense.
Leslie