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These guys are already back in my backyard, during summer it's usually full of them.

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And I've also seen several queen bumblebees buzzing around on the lookout for a nesting spot, great to see them again. I hope a fit of late winter frost doesn't get them later this month.

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Also discuss mothing or other insect related hobbies.
I've just bult myself a skinner trap (pic not related), but I was wondering if anyone else has experience with them and what the 'ideal' opening in the middle is, can't seem to find this anywhere. Also what kind of setups do you use, looking especially for ideas for a mobile/battery powered setup.

I once found a moth on my boxers in the morning, he/she was inactive. I gently placed him in a lunch box with lint and some water in a bottle cap and let them sleep throughout the day. (The cap slit was wide enough for fresh air, but not wide enough to allow spiders to get in). At night they woke up, I carried them to a window. They gave me a little dance that I edited and then they flew away.

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Went on the first hike of the year, and even though almost nothing was blooming yet I saw lots of yellow band underwings.
>>5106267
Neat, what kind of hawk moth is that?

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>>5106267
Nice pic!

>>5106270
white brow, I think

>>5106301
ty bro

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Still waiting on my stag beetles to have larvae

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can anyone ID this fat fuck
location is the outskirts of orlando

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>>5109130

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>>5109130
>>5109131
xylocopa
I'm trying to rear Greta oto butterflies.

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>>5106243
I don't really have much to contribute, but do you have any experience lightsheeting? I'm trying to figure out what bulb type to use and a good power source solution. I'm not as interested in collecting I just wanna do some macro photography.

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>>5109744
Yes I do! I used to do that last year. Currently I'm using a Sylvana UV BL368 20 watt Blacklight, which are cheap and can be put in a regular socket. Last summer, for sheeting, I disassembled one of those insect traps they use in warehouses and stores and took one of those LED bars out. It attracted tons of moths, however, even when I put my converter at the correct current and voltage indicated on the lights they overheated very quickly and several of the LEDs on the bar burnt up. I've used the Sylvana once to sheet but that was early last month so didn't really have good conditions to moth in. Still got about 5 species.

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Look who I met!

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Also this fella. Red beetle.

>>5106241
Boxelder?

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Hymenopterans are aesthetically perfect

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>>5110158
Thank you, that's really helpful. I was looking at mercury vapor bulbs and full spectrum (heat) lamps for reptiles.
>>5110312
They really are, but some are too hot to handle. I used tweezers for this dasymutillidae (ursus?).

If I make a discord group for invertebrates will anyone join?

bugs are gross

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(true) bugs are cool! I can't wait for macro season to come back around.

>>5110183
No, these are firebugs. Its the european version of the boxelder.

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>>5110605

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>>5110606

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>>5110607

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>>5110608

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>>5110398
No problem, and from all I've read and heard from other mothing enthousiasts mercury vapor bulbs also work very well. The main differences are that the UV light doesn't need a converter, is a little bit cheaper (and adding the cost of the converter makes the UV light quite a bit cheaper), however mercury light bulbs are a lot stronger and are able to attract more moths from further away.
The main reasons I went with the UV light are that I live in Europe and mercury light bulbs are a bit harder to come by, and because I live in a suburban area, so I wanted to minimize the light emitted to not annoy my neighbors.

Bugs scare me, when I was a kid a bee hid inside my coke can in a park then she stung me as if she owned the fucking can motherfucker my dad bought it for me why the fuck are you acting territorial the fucking can was mine.
From that day on I decided to always murder insects when given the chance, other than spiders because I liked spider man as a kid and hoped to get bitten by one someday so I could stop wearing glasses and date Mary Jane.

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>>5110921
Boohoo faggot, you got a widdle sting. Grow a pair

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>>5110921
Coward.

>>5110921
faggot oversensitive loser

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I'm wanting to set up a small terrarium on my computer desk, maybe something no bigger than a 3 gallon aquarium. I've made a few terrariums before but much larger and with frogs and lizards. This one I want to have some kind of bug in it.

Anyone have any cool ideas? Hoping for something unique and fun to watch while I play vidya.

My top contender right now is some species of millipedes. Something like pic related or those feather millipedes look really cool too. It seems like they're pretty easy to care for and they're pretty active so i can watch them.

-Velvet Worms seemed really cool, though they're nocturnal and a bit harder to care for from what i've read.
-I've kept mantids before and thought they were really neat, so they're an option.
-Stick insects and leaf insects are REALLY cool but all the coolest ones are banned from the USA and those that are available here seem really expensive.
-Slugs and snails seem cool but i don't know much about them
-isopods are really cute and extremely low maintenance, but they're kinda small. maybe that would be alright though.

anything else i havent thought of yet? no arachnids or roaches.

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>>5111379
a group of blue death feigning beetles. very easy care and long-lived unlike other beetles

>>5111379
Mantids and stick insects don't live very long unfortunately. Other anon is right on death feigning beetles, iirc they can also cohabilitate with velvet ants though all velvet ants in the pet trade right now are wild caught.

>>5110587
>invertebrates
snails allowed?

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>>5111379
>Slugs and snails seem cool but i don't know much about them
yes & then its time to change that

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This spider was CHILLING. Hanging off the towel bar on silk, front 2 legs completely put, other ones tucked in, spinning back and forth.

Thought it was dead. Poked it, it climbed back on the towel bar, fist bump, collected in cup, let it outside.

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Also got this spider tying up a fly. The fly was buzzing a lot, them the spider dropped it once it was fully encased. I put the fly back in the web, but the spider dropped it again. Not hungry? Just bored?

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Spider on the towel bar. Proof of life. Hanging out like a bungee jumper.

>>5111379
>My top contender right now is some species of millipedes. Something like pic related or those feather millipedes look really cool too
Your pic is an African giant millipede, they’re not hard to keep but need a way larger enclosure than 3 gallons and are often pretty expensive despite mostly being imports. Feather millipedes or anything else that size would work fine
>It seems like they're pretty easy to care for and they're pretty active so i can watch them
They’re easy to care for, it’s just that sifting through the bullshit around their care is more complicated. Substrates marketed for exotics including millipedes like eco earth, repti soil or anything else with coco fibre/coco peat will kill them. They need a substrate of rotting wood/leaves and different millipedes have different preferences

How do I stop being millipedephobic? I get a gigantic cortisol spike and get nauseous every time I even see an image of a millipede. But they seem so friendly and objectively cute. What do I do?

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>>5112020
Exposure therapy for sure. They're harmless and move slowly, nothing to be afraid of.

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>>5112038
oops

>>5112040
I used to rent a place in a very tropical part of my country and there was a single fuckhuge millipede that lived in the yard. At least the size of a hotdog, probably bigger. Every time I saw it on my way home from work I would yell obscenities at it. Telling it "I'll fucking kill you, faggot ass motherfucker!" while it stared ahead with its retarded little face would make me kek so much that over time I almost stopped being scared of it. But now that I don't see it anymore I've regressed a lot. It's been 2 years and I still weirdly miss that particular millipede.

>>5112262
You’re a pussy faggot

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I had a praying mantis guest yesterday. Got some video of him cleaning his antenae. He was reluctant to let me carry him out so had to use a cup.

>>5106240
I hate keeping bugs, I love them, but I hate keeping them.
they require so much work and every time I find they undermine all my efforts to keep them alive and happy.
>try to keep beehives, bees just invade the surrounding woods every time
I just want you to live with me bees

cute bugs

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>aw yiss a fresh feather for my nest

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>>5110312
Objective truth.

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I finally saw a male carpenter bee? It was just being a janky mess on the sidewalk so I guess it already mated and ready to die.

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Saw this on my father's car one day. Still trying to find out what it is.

>>5115224
plume moth

There's a house spider hanging under a closet for half a fucking year now keeping me from cleaning but there are no bugs, I guess I should move it somewhere now that it's getting warmer

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What is this thing

>>5115617
a bug

>>5115621
Bruh

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>>5115617
cutworm of some sort, three's roughly a trillion different species and even if you gave us the exact area it was found it would probably still be impossible to get a positive ID.
>>5115621
not hemiptera!

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>>5115621

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Pet wasp.
Felt like some of his spikes broke off on me. I think he liked my beer breath.

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Anyone know what these are? New Jersey area if that helps.

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>>5115757
crane flies

>>5115642
Thanks mothbro

Can I just pick up any insect with my bare hands or only the ones I 100% know what they are?
I'm scared of them transmitting some disease or something. I don't mind being stung or bitten if I won't die or get evil megacancer topical necrosis.
Also what about smashing annoying flies? Can I do that with just my hands?

>>5115102
fluffy
>>5116291
No you probably won't get any diseases. Use common sense. Moths/grasshoppers/crickets/beetles will let you hold them. Use a flyswatter for flies since they do eat gross stuff.

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Found this beautiful little bugger slumbering in a lavender before nightfall.
Any idea what it is? It's between 4 and 6mm, green and red stripes with indentations on the green stripes on the back of its shell, blue hue over green, purple over red, with golden shine all over.

Wonderful golden shine easily visible on its belly.

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>>5116548
Backside

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>>5116551
Woke it up, felt a little guilty so put it in a flower I put in sugar water to continue its night.
Didn't know they were eating pollen. The little fella has been feasting eversince. Probably drunk from the decomposing flower.

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>>5116548
>>5116551
>>5116553
I'd start with Chrysolina (americana looks like a dead ringer) and work back from what's local to you. Providing a rough location is helpful for this sort of request.

I encountered a hated foe tonight in the garden.

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>>5116592
Yep that is it. I didn't provide a specific location since beetles are an invasive species from the Americas and usually spread somewhat evenly on the globe.
I put it back on the lavender last night and it's back in its slumbering state for the day. Funny they are known as lavender beetles so I inadvertently put it back in its natural habitat.

>pic
These are disgusting, especially in motion. Got a video?

>>5116679
>These are disgusting, especially in motion. Got a video?
That's one's entombed in salt now, but if I find any more I'll make a video before killing them. I'm very excited for macro photography season so start. All the critters I've seen so far are too small to photograph, stuff like pinhead spiders but I'm toting my camera around just in case. Might upgrade to the olympus 90mm this year.

>>5116686
Very cool, just been using my Samsung S25 Ultra. It has a 50 or 200MP camera with up to 5x zoom and a 12MP camera with up to 100x zoom. Unfortunately it "enhances" every pictures with AI whatever that means, taking away the rawness. I opted out of every AI features but this one is embedded into the camera software I feel like. Still it takes some good pictures for a phone.