Genus
Species
Stock
Culture status
In culture
Foodplants
Bramble (Rubus spp.)
Salal (Gaultheria shallon)
Oak (Quercus robur)
Hazel (Corylus avellana)
Beech (Fagus sylvatica)
Breeding notes
(by Bruno Kneubuehler)
the more detailed care sheet will follow here later on...
- from Efate (Vanuatu)
- there is a similar species on Fiji. But Fiji is more than 1000 km away from Vanuatu, over the open sea. Therefore a superficial comparison is not good enough to determine whether the population from Vanuatu and Fiji actually belong to the same species
- feed well on bramble, Salal, oak, hazel and beech
- adult females can be quite choosy when fed with late-winter bramble from the forests (the ones with fine, small thorns). Maybe the plant is drawing nutrients from the leaves over winter? And this could change the taste of the bramble, so that these females do not like it anymore?
- in my experience, these females do still feed well on the bramble variation which has very big, strong thorns - Rubus fruticosus . While they do not like the bramble with fine thorns (which is often growing in the forests) anymore
- evergreen oak might also be a good alternative for this species, though I have not tested this
- remove the bramble thorns for the adult females, otherwise they get hurt badly by these thorns
- cage for 1 or (at the most) 2 adult pairs must be at least 60 x 40 x 40 (hxwbxd, cm)!
- incubation about 3 - 4 months, yet some nymphs can also hatch months after the first nymphs
- spray regularly (4 -5 times a week) but let water dry up before you spray again
- females about 18 cm, males about 11 cm
- most females are bright green, while are few are green-brown-black mottled or entirely brown
- very fidgety, especially older nymphs and adults
- therefore this species must be handled very carefully and be kept in a big cage, otherwise males and females will loose legs quickly
- a medium difficult species