And they keep growing… and growing…
The Eri silkworms are growing by leaps and bounds. Once they shed their skins and entered the second instar, their growth seems faster – partly just because they are big enough to notice the changes!
This is today’s picture. The worms are quite visibly larger today, than yesterday. By comparison, the picture below is the babies just eight days ago:
I’m glad you make these posts. I find them really fascinating.
I’m trying to document the process, more than anything… I think I may end up putting together a small book, or at least an intensive website, about the process. It’s one of those splinter hobbies, where there are just very few good resources. It seems like the serious moth hobbyists and the serious silk hobbyists never meet.
In just a couple of weeks, the mulberries will be in leaf, and we’ll get to go through the whole process with the mulberry worms. =)
I agree. They’re utterly enlightening.
It seems like the moth hobbists wouldn’t be very fond of the silk ones.
It would certainly make for an interesting convention though 🙂
Sweet. I look forward to those posts.
Actually, the moth hobbyists and the silk hobbyists have conflicting needs (what’s best for the cocoon, isn’t necessarily best for the moth) – but, unlike some of the “butterfly gardening” folks, most of the serious lepidoptera hobbyists are cold-blooded killers – can’t be letting the Prime Specimen go fluttering about and bash up its wings! They blithely talk about “mounting” and “spreading” the “specimens”… but they don’t usually mention the trip to the cyanide jar.
Just for sake of reference:
We’re at Budcon 1 now… should be splitting the skin any day now!
the little masters say “worship us”
do you play them soothing music to grow by?
Thank you for posting. these are neat.
How did you learn about all this? Are you self taught? I find it very interesting! Recently, the CBC (Canadian Public Radio) had a segment on raising silk worms. Treenway silk gave ‘Richardsons Round up’ a box of Silk worms to raise. It was so kewl! Then, the host gave away the silk coccoons to listeners as a prize! Crazy Canuck stuff!
I love Treenway! They’re one of the best around.
I learned about most of it just from reading on the Internet, and from doing it – there’s an amazing amount of trial and error that goes into the process, and I’ve learned a bunch of stuff that the sources I’ve read, never mention! That’s one of the reasons that I’m undertaking to document this so thoroughly and with lots of pictures, so that eventually *my* website will have all the info in one place.