This is good stuff, Pete! I'd love to hear more as your project evolves!

KellyS

I think it's cool!

OK, for the thousands of you that are following this topic (haha!): I'm afraid my attempt to encourage BSFs to breed in captivity failed. (For some reason, my wife did not share my disappointment...)

The details: I purchased a small animal cage at the local pet store to put the BSFs in; it was about 6" wide x 10" long x 8" high, with a plastic screen top that had a handy hatch in the middle. I put a couple of large chunks of moldy pumpkin and a couple of cups of mulch in the bottom. I then captured about a dozen BSFs, and placed them in the cage. They spent a lot of time crawling around and sitting on the pumpkin chunks, but one by one they keeled over without, apparently, having bothered to mate. No larvae appeared.

I did more research on BSFs online, and came across one document that said that BSFs mate "on the wing." Since there wasn't much room in the cage to get airborne, much less stay there, perhaps that may have been why none of the adults were attracted to each other. Or maybe they don't like pumpkin. Or I suppose it's possible that I collected a dozen of the same sex.

If it is true that BSFs mate on the wing, it probably isn't possible to get a big enough cage to mate them in. But since BSFs are also supposed to be notoriously poor fliers, I am suspicious of this factoid. If the opportunity presents itself, I'm going to try this experiment again, with different foodstuffs, and a bigger cage, if I can find one. (At that point, I may need to find a new wife as well, but sometimes one must make sacrifices in the interest of science!)

Peter

Peter,

I would guess a decaying pumpkin would look very attractive to an egg laying female.

Have you thought about using a butterfly cage with a broken branch in it? You could get some netting and make one with a five gallon bucket or similar size container.

Good luck. Keep us informed.

Charles

P.S.

I accidentally drowned about a hundred who did manage to migrate out of the bin and into the moat I constructed :(
I used to get one or two fly out when I opened the lid, but not anymore.

The moat was a deterrent for fire ants (cayenne pepper didn't work at all).

I pulled out as many as I could find, but they weren't wiggling. I found a few that were moving and put them
in the woods.