leaf mulch for Cetoniinae (flower beetles), well-decayed wood for Dynastinae (rhino beetles), and mid-decayed wood for Lucanidae (stag beetles) which I have outlined HERE. Normally when using substrate collected from nature, different types of materials have to be collected depending on the type of beetle: e.g. Flake Soil is the go-to substrate for advanced breeders as it performs exceptionally better for larval growth and overall adult size than the conventional leaf / wood substrates collected from nature. It can be made at home quite easily by adding various additives to sawdust and fermenting it for a period of time until it turns into a uniform, soil-like substrate. □įS (flake soil) is a type of highly regarded substrate that is suitable for the rearing of beetle larvae. Many new recipes derived from my original recipe/ guide here have appeared throughout the web since then, which I am very happy to see as it is evidence that more people are getting involved in this hobby! As this is the original recipe which most other recipes online have been based on, please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any queries regarding any of the information here, or the safety of potential new additives that many of these new guides have been including. This in-depth Flake Soil recipe of mine was first published online in 2020 with the aim of making beetle breeding more accessible to beginner hobbyists. Don’t Waste.Trypoxylus dichotomus larvae on Flake Soil As with any collecting, don’t take more than you can use. I met a fair number of parents and teachers collecting for their classrooms. For classrooms or personal collections, a handful of beetles should suffice. Some people collect them professionally, and gather thousands of beetles in a good year. They live 4-6 months as adults, so we can show them through the fall and into winter.Ī note on conservation: These beetles are quite common across their range, but it’s still better not to take more than you need. They tend to do a good job of changing the way people think about insects. Dynastes are great for education because they are so large, quite beautiful as far as beetles go, and harmless to people. In the end, I collected about twenty beetles, most of which are going in our living collection at work. Other adventures were also had during our two-day collection trip, not least being the time I forgot to seal one of the boxes of beetles, and my girlfriend found them hiding in our sleeping bags and pillows. This is a tarantula that was crossing the road when we found it. The loser has lost some pride, a chance to mate, and valuable calories that must be replaced before he can compete again, so there’s a lot at stake. The advantage is usually to the largest male, but since it’s a very formalized way of competing no one is risking serious injury. They are strong enough to lift one another over their heads if they can get a good hold. The males will lock their horns together and try to pin or flip each other. Quite harmless to humans, but the beetles use them to wrestle for mates. By raising and lowering the head relative to the prothorax, the Dynastes can open and close them like jaws. The prothorax, which is the body segment between the head and the thorax (covered by the wing casing), has the top horn. The lower “jaw” of the headgear is a horn on the very top of the head. These beetles live off tree sap and rotting fruit, so they don’t have strong chompers and are actually quite harmless. In fact, the true jaws are tiny and hidden under the head. The males have a set of “jaws” on their heads. If they get wet, they turn solid dark brown, but then revert back to tan with speckles as they dry. Their shells are unique, with markings that vary between individuals. Females get slightly heavier than the males, but tend to be shorter because they lack the long headgear that makes the males so attractive. You just pick them up and plop them in a container. The picture above shows the standard way of collecting. These tend to be parking lot lights or gas station lights, but I know of people using tennis courts and sport fields as well. These beetles are found at higher elevations in Arizona and a few surrounding states, and are most easily found by checking lights in towns surrounded by oak forest. The beetle in question was Dynastes granti, the Western Hercules Beetle, and possible the largest beetle in the United States. In this case, I’m referring to gas station and parking lot lamps, which are significantly brighter than anything I could put together. It works very well, but sometimes it’s better to use other people’s lights. I wrote last time about bug-hunting using a blacklight.
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