Breeding Parnassius apollo

Until about October (or maybe the second half of September, if they start to hatch), keep just in the room. You can use a film box for this purpose (white is more convenient).
Then before wintering in tubes tightened from the ends with gas. Put them in a box with a double bottom and in the lid of which there are ventilation holes. Under false-wet sphagnum. On the bottom of the napkin and on top of it are already these tubes with grena. Put the box first for a couple of weeks in +5C and then you can take it to the standard-5C-10C. Below ten, it is better not to freeze. If the temperature rises above freezing, the caterpillars can come out, even if it is only for a short time. Therefore, you need to think about the options for power outage. You can spend the winter outside by placing such a box in a pit, covered with slate, for example. Just dig a hole in the shade. Everything is covered with snow on top (there is drainage at the bottom of the pit to avoid spring flooding of the box).
With Apollo and other scavengers, the method is simple. Take plastic containers (first the smallest jars) from under margarine "Rama" or similar (now there are all sorts of plastic containers for food on sale), put a napkin and a sprig of a feed plant on the bottom. A very good plant for the entire APOLLO group is Sedum telephium, but you can use any other plant that is readily eaten by caterpillars (they must grow at the same time), for example, I feed all Sedum caucasicum, because it grows in abundance in the surrounding area, and in terms of biomass it is almost like telephium. You can use Radiola rosea, Sedum telephium, Sedum album from the available ones. First, you need to use young twigs with tender leaves - it will be easier for the caterpillars to eat. The stalk can be wrapped with cotton wool soaked in water, and wrapped on top with a piece of plastic bag (only food!) and tie it with a thread - so that the water does not flow out. So the plant will last fresh longer. It is advisable to change the food daily, especially at the first age. Put strips of black paper in the container (you can wrap packs of photo paper) - caterpillars like to warm up on it and grow faster. Above the container, put an incandescent lamp of about 20-40 watts at a distance of about 20 cm. That's all. You don't need to put water in the cage - the caterpillars will drown. Put the croutons (eggs) directly in the container.
If the caterpillars do not come out of the eggs well after wintering, then they can be slightly stimulated by placing the eggs in a container under a lamp on a wet (but without puddles, so as not to drown) napkin: heat, light and humidity changes stimulate the exit. Parnassians in general instantly come out of the eggs as soon as they get into the heat. This is one of the snags of their wintering season.
The main conditions for successful breeding of apollo are heat, light and dryness. Their excrement is wet so put a napkin on the bottom of the open (!!!) the cage should be changed daily. You can throw crumpled paper for grown caterpillars. It will absorb excess moisture and they warm up on it by climbing higher to the lamp.
Sailboats and saturnii can be paired manually - they have an open general apparatus.
Saturnias don't feed. therefore, it is easier to work with them, but for sailboats, the technology is the same.
The male should be prepared in the cage for 3-4 days. The cage can be an ordinary aquarium, covered from the inside with gauze or tulle (to make it easier to crawl). Warm them with a lamp and feed them well with a 5-10% solution of fructose or honey. To do this, a bowl with a moistened cotton wool of fructose solution is placed in the cage (change daily). It would also be good to feed them additionally, holding the wings and carefully unwinding the proboscis with a pin, submerging it in a drop of solution. Hungry butterflies begin to greedily drink it at the same time. Males should be actively flying and ripe for mating, while females should be as fresh as possible. A female who has lived for 2-3 days may already be unsuitable for mating. Although, if you keep females in the refrigerator at +4C and light humidity, they can remain "suitable" for mating for 2 weeks. Parnassus females are the fastest to fail, while swallowtails and polyxenes last longer. When mating, the male and female are joined by the genitals, while the male's valvae and uncus should be wide open, and then close on the female's abdomen. The male freezes and hangs on to the female. If the couple does not want to mate, then after 2-3 attempts it is necessary to give them a rest. Try changing pairs.
After mating (which in swallowtails and polyxenes lasts 1-2 hours, and in Parnassus almost half a day), the female is put in a cage with fresh food plants, which is placed in the sun or under a lamp. The female must eat well so that her eggs mature. Feed in the same way as males before mating. Most Parnassians do not need a forage plant for laying eggs - they throw them anywhere. This also applies to apollo.
Stonecrop easily reproduces vegetatively - break up plants and run into pots or ditches with earth. Put it in the room and make sure that the ground does not dry out. It is not necessary to cover with a film - the cleaner contains a lot of moisture like a succulent. But keep in mind - apollo is voracious and you need to have a lot of tops. Stonecrop is easily propagated by seeds and in a couple of years you can get a whole plantation. But vegetative reproduction is easier in my opinion. I have some seeds (I could have sent them), but the growers still won't get enough biomass until spring.
Good luck!

Here is a photo of the winter hut.

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Put the box first for a couple of weeks in +5C and then you can take it to the standard-5C-10C. Below ten, it is better not to freeze. If the temperature rises above freezing, the caterpillars can come out, even if it is only for a short time. Therefore, you need to think about the options for power outage. You can spend the winter outside by placing such a box in a pit, covered with slate, for example. Just dig a hole in the shade. Everything is covered with snow on top (there is drainage at the bottom of the pit to avoid spring flooding of the box).

Question, I have in the freezer -20C-25C. Where to find -5C-10C?

Another question, the stonecrop is perennial, and can grow all year round in pots in an apartment without wintering? Or should he also spend the winter on the balcony in pots?

Question, I have in the freezer -20C-25C. Where to find -5C-10C?

At the bottom of the refrigerator is about that. For accuracy, you can measure the temperature and find the optimal location in your refrigerator.

Question, I have in the freezer -20C-25C. Where to find -5C-10C?

At the bottom of the refrigerator is about that. For accuracy, you can measure the temperature and find the optimal location in your refrigerator.

I measured, but in the freezer exactly-20C in any compartment.
In the refrigerator in the middle of +6C, I didn't measure it at the bottom, but I doubt that there will be a minus.
This temperature can be found in old refrigerators, where the freezer is built inside the refrigerator, there you can find any temperature from +8C to-15C, but in a two-chamber such a trick will not work, in the refrigerator plus, and in the freezer a strong minus.

I measured, but in the freezer exactly-20C in any compartment.
In the refrigerator in the middle of +6C, I didn't measure it at the bottom, but I doubt that there will be a minus.
This temperature can be found in old refrigerators, where the freezer is built inside the refrigerator, there you can find any temperature from +8C to-15C, but in a two-chamber such a trick will not work, in the refrigerator plus, and in the freezer a strong minus.

I was talking about the old refrigerator. Such as "Mir", "Saratov", "Sviyaga", etc. of the Soviet era.

This post was edited by Aaata - 31.07.2011 20: 16

For this purpose, I specifically bought a separate small refrigerator c-5-7C in the freezer and do not buzz.
The scab may grow, but it will hurt and it is better to let it rest.

For this purpose, I specifically bought a separate small refrigerator c-5-7C in the freezer and do not buzz.
The scab may grow, but it will hurt and it is better to let it rest.

That is, in winter, do not get dirty for breeding, wait for spring and young shoots of cleaning?
Does it make sense to plant a stonecrop in the country? In the spring, when the shoots are small, it's probably hard to look for grass in nature?

Of course, in winter to grow - firebrands... Yes, and smaller imagos will most likely be.
Of course, plant ochitok in the country. He should have time to get started before the fall. Partly in pots - and there will be no need to rummage in the grass in the spring...

Achieved with the minimum adjustment-13C will work, I won't freeze?

I decided to winter the eggs in the country in a hole half a meter deep, so as not to freeze. I covered the pit with a board from above.
18.04 I got them out of there, and having brought them home, the caterpillars began to come out within an hour.
I fed them clean-up, swallowed those still, ate around the clock. I put it under a 60W lamp and it burned around the clock, I'm in a hurry to get butterflies out, because I'm leaving for an expedition on 9.06.
11.05 they started pupating, now they are finishing. I hope the butterflies will come out on May 25-30.

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May 25 - currently actively withdrawn...

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I heard from "some breeders "(och experienced in this business "guys") that apollo democratus (about others I can't say anything) "from captivity" is not very capable of flight? "fly a few meters, fall, and then die there, unable to take off...." for nutrition and copulation...
Have you tried releasing your butterflies to "free float" in the natural environment=where they were taken from? or at least on the waller b / m large (~at least 10*3 m)?
for the "purity of the experiment", it was necessary to "throw a thermometer" at all stages. the most "budget" solution-a thermometer from a set of plastic windows (if the company did not present it, then you can buy it at any cantor for the production of these at 120-170 rubles/sht)-is a great thing! it does not sink in water, but it burns in fire, the body is made of plastic, but it keeps all the disadvantages and blows of fate at 5+ (tested by personal experience).
"they say" before going out and when spreading their wings, they like heat...what was the temperature when leaving the pupa ? under the lamp specifically for "enlightened" pupae, or was the lamp lit off to the side at all?

This post was edited by AGG - 05/31/2012 05: 19

older people were sitting on a few grand in a jar?
how many eggs/ butterflies were released? a lot of misshapen butterflies?

There were 160 eggs, 140 pupae pupated, 99 butterflies hatched so far, I hope more will come out.

Deformed butterflies 10 pcs.

Butterflies could not fly around the apartment, as mentioned above. The pupae were in a room out of direct sunlight. The cage was kept in the dark during the release of butterflies, so that the bred butterflies did not fight and did not interfere with each other. In general, I am happy with the result. But, probably, I would not breed a larger number, the caterpillars eat a lot, it is difficult to feed.

Excellent result!
To avoid problems with food, we tried to do it like this, as in the photo. That was 3 years ago. The experiment, by the way, ended in failure. No matter how hard we tried to make everything as tight as possible, but every day there were fewer tracks. And we're tired of fighting ants. Now just a sediment on the bed is growing. I have a private house. Guests sometimes go to the garden very surprised-what kind of unknown cultivated plant?! - this is a rare type of cabbage!)) We sell grams to elite restaurants))
Now we usually grow in ordinary cans on the table, but we keep one piece at a time.
This year, by the way, the strongest fire took place in a typical area where caterpillars were usually collected. Felled old logs 30 cm in length were burned so that even coals were not left. There was a very strong wind. Search day - 1 caterpillar. I hope that the population will recover normally.

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- Is there a photo of that biotope of the "type locality" (from that point a new subspecies was described??) where did you collect caterpillars in nature!?
I would have made an aviary for fattening caterpillars wrong - we have clean-up plants prefer sandy loam terrain and usually on the southern exposure (forest edge, slope of a beam, etc.), that is, here the soil would need to be raised, the soil is clearly "damp" for this species (how is it sealed? were you afraid that the "geese" will stretch a draft?), you need a "blowout" ("geese" probably died from a fungus?) and good solar insolation!!!

This is a photo from last year in May.
The subspecies is described from near the city of Ulan-Ude, where we collect it. I don't know exactly from which hill the typical series was taken, but judging by the descriptions, plus / minus a couple of kilometers. So the topotype of buryatikus is accurate.
This cage is more than 2 meters long and about a meter wide. It was covered in organza, so it was drafty. Dampness-photo apparently after the rain, it was usually dry in the cage. After a dozen or two caterpillars were removed from the enclosure, they were moved back home. Tightness is what would not run away. It seemed more convenient to raise children at home.

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- Is there a photo of that biotope of the "type locality" (from that point a new subspecies was described??) where did you collect caterpillars in nature!?
I would have made an aviary for fattening caterpillars wrong - we have clean-up plants prefer sandy loam terrain and usually on the southern exposure (forest edge, slope of a beam, etc.), that is, here the soil would need to be raised, the soil is clearly "damp" for this species (how is it sealed? were you afraid that the "geese" will stretch a draft?), you need a "blowout" ("geese" probably died from a fungus?) and good solar insolation!!!

Yes, no aviaries are needed. Plant 3 caterpillars in 800-gram jars and keep them at home, constantly lighting them with incandescent lamps. And the fat ones do not dry for a long time, so there are no problems with replacing the feed box. And in order for the fodder to hang over the substrate, stick wooden toothpicks into the substrate and the cleaning stalks will be located correctly and will not rot. When pupating, toothpicks or even wooden skewers are simply necessary if they protrude above the surface of the feeder. They will be pupaed up...This applies to all sailboats.
And it is better to attach pupae to tulle curtains before hatching. Tokda imago, having dried off, will crawl up, filling up with hemolymph and you will hear a blow on the cornice and a flight. Choose luxury ones and deformation will be minimized

This post was edited by Macroglossum on-03.06.2012 11: 25

Yes, and more... To avoid rotting... As a substrate-a circle of isolon or even orgolite (working surface), Then it will be easier to remove govnetso. Do not even take out the circle, but make a nozzle on the vacuum cleaner from the dropper tube and clean it by opening the intermediate valve of the vacuum cleaner (curtain cleaning mode)

And even to the tulle curtains to fix naturally not pupae and tubes of paper in which to place the pupae head up... That's all I know about breeding apollo (Forrest Gump)

Hello!

Butterflies bred-fly! I launched two defective ones from the balcony, flew as expected, far away and with a climb.
The end result is 51 perfect males and 47 perfect females, plus 14 defective butterflies.

The total result of 160 eggs - 140 pupae-112 butterflies (14 defective).

In my opinion, the breeding of Apollo and other Red Book animals and plants, followed by the release of individuals into the natural habitats of the species, is extremely useful in order to preserve biodiversity, maintain the integrity of ecosystems and protect nature!

This is probably true, I released several fertilized females, in places where Apollo was not observed for 20 years, there was a lot of it there before, let's see what happens!

Dear friends, has anyone had any experience growing apollons on Sempervivum species? Somewhere in the literature, such a possibility has slipped through, but how in reality?