Epiphora lugardi cocoons

You overwintered a semi desert/dried savanna African species at 3.3C?? 🤣 please learn about habitat before you waste your money again…

Well, if they survived the winter, look up the weather in Kenya, it's the wet season. I have lugardi as well, I kept mine cool and dry

over the winter in an unheated room, now they have been warm and humid since March 29 2024. Nothing is happening for me.

Soon I will probably have to see if I can weigh them without taking them off the string they are hanging on.

I did have a still unidentified mystery moth hatch from a cocoon in the batch that had a slightly different look to it some time back,

I made a post about it.

Well, maybe wet season is over. It is mid 70's.

Exotics are not easy for us, even native desert species are problematic.

Hi Jacob, Epiphora moths (and many moths from Africa in general) can be difficult to synchronise in captivity. This is of course a generalisation of a big continent with many different climates, but many places in tropical Africa have a 'monsoon' season (wet, and slightlly cooler) and then a 'dry' season (dry, hotter). Many African Saturniidae are capable of extensively diapausing through the dry seasons.

Unlike temperate species this diapause does not seem to be controlled by cold/warm weather, but perhaps by humid/dry (+barometric pressure?). This can make it hard to simulate in captivity.

For me species like Argema mimosae, Epiphora ssp., Bunaea alcinoe and others have the same issue: they can diapause for years(!) if they don't like the conditions or emerge very sporadically.

The best you could do is look up the weather where they're from in Kenya; perhaps simulate a dry season and a wet season. I tried this in captivity with limited succes (it did work for Argema mimosae one time). Good luck!

And yeah.. I'm not sure if they can survive 3.3C, sorry. It may have killed them.

Then again, some tropical moth species are suprisingly resilient (I've hibernated rainforest species from Costa Rica or Brazil outdoors in the Netherlands before!). But there's no guarantees..

Epiphora lugardi is tricky because there does not seem to be much info about this insect.

Fair enough Jacob, I wasn't trying to be rude, I did find it funny though but Im sorry.

Whoever told you that was wrong, Kenya is right at the equator and is one of the hottest countries in Africa by average outside of the Sahel region. The area where these cocoons came from does not experience those types of temperatures, pretty much ever. In Nairobi which is relatively colder, temps might get that low 2-3 times a year in a cold year, if that. Temperatures bellow 10C being unusual and only lasting for a few hours (during the night time). If you kept them in the fridge for months they are most definitely all dead. Sorry for being the carrier of bad news. For future reference, do not use the fridge ever again with Afrotropical species and please make sure you invest in some literature before you spend money with other Afrotropical species. Take your time with learning about the Miombo woodland, the Afromontane rain forest and grasslands, the dry savannas, the plants that occur there, etc.

There you are, maybe the cold killed them, maybe not. I have refrigerated species that I found out later weren't supposed to be exposed

to low temps, and didn't have issues, so one can never tell. Hard with cocoons to determine alive or not, and these lugardi cocoons are

tough, I think they could be stepped on and survive (not recommended) . I have a digital scale I use, but it only works best when you

weigh animals when you get them, or just after forming a pupa.

Like I mentioned earlier, and as Bartmantis said, exotics are tricky, I have a nearly 2 year old Rothschildia arethusa still going, the others having hatched sporadically.

Don't worry people! If anything happens with my Epiphora lugardi, you'll be the 2nd to know.