Subject: Re: feeding painted ladies/chalcedon checkerspots

From: Neil Jones <[email-masked]>
Date: 27 May 1995 13:13:40 +0100

In article <[email-masked]>
           [email-masked] "Tien-Yee Chiu" writes:

> Can someone give me advice on the best way to feed painted lady
> and chalcedon checkerspot adults?  Obviously a hummingbird
> feeder isn't going to do it, since they have such short
> mouthparts.

I have experience in breeding a close relative of the
 Chalecedon Checkerspot as well as other species. Might I suggest
using test tubes filled with a 5% sugar solution. (Do not make it much stronger
as this could cause problems.) The top could be plugged with cotton wool
and surrounded with some kind of flower design. (I do not think the flower
design is essential.)
I have made do in the past with pads of tissue paper soaked in the solution
for feeding exhaused buterflies and fed them by hand.
You might also add a small amount of salt to the solution.
Honey could be a substitute for sugar and may be more successful.  

> Please let me know ASAP as they seem to be going through 
> normal flowers at a frightening rate...

If you are using cut flowers they may well become exhausted, but you could
if all else fails try recharging the flowers by pouring the artificial nectar
into the top. You would need something fine like a hypodemic needle. Don't
inject it into the flowers just stick it in the top.
I have used potted dandelions (Taraxacum) as a nectar source in the past.
Our checkerspot E. aurinia( We call it the Marsh Fritillary) is a 
threatened European Species and there may be some indication that certain
nectar sources are prefered in particular a thistle Cirsium dissectum
and certain early flowered bramble microspecies within the Rubus
fruticosus agg.

> Tien Chiu
> [email-masked]

-- 
Neil Jones
[email-masked]

---

From: [email-masked] (Tien-Yee Chiu)
Date: 26 May 1995 19:26:24 GMT

Tien Chiu
[email-masked]