Share photos of your cat cages

As long as the chrysalis is hard to the touch, you can safely move them. You are right about the wings not having enough room to expand for those in the 2" space of your cage. Moving those would be a good idea! Good luck!

So far, I'm very happy with the cage that my sister and I built. There is another thread started by me with more details about how we built it towards the end of the thread. That thread linked me to this one. I really appreciate everyone posting photos of their cages and telling what they liked or would change about them. That information was invaluable to us. This whole butterfly/caterpillar thing is a new experience for both of us.

I'm proud to say that I've adopted quite a few Gulf Fritillaries and One lone Monarch. I haven't seen any cats in my own yard, though I check several times a day.

Janet

Janet, I know I've already said this....but, that cage is fantastic! You should make up some blueprints and sell them.

Am so happy to see all those cat cages!!! Ya'll are so creative!!! I really do like the looks of those big cat cages.

Am raising another dozen or so Giant Swallowtails and two Variegated Fritillaries. Still have three Black Swallowtail chrysalids from April. Had four but one finally eclosed yesterday!!! Took that bugger six months to emerge!!! Fritillatries, Queens and Monarchs are so much easier to raise as they've never gone into the diapause stage here. Baby sitting those swallowtails drive me batty!!! :o)

I also raised seven Ceraunus Blues a couple of months ago. Talk about having to be careful!!! The chrysalids are smaller than a grain of rice!!!

~ Cat

And here's a photo of one of the teeny tiny itty bitty super dooper little Ceraunus Blues that eclosed. Yep, that's the tip of my finger...you can see just how tiny that little butterfly is!!!

~ Cat

This message was edited Oct 17, 2006 8:30 AM

Beautiful!! We have lots of them, mostly on our bottlebrush but I have never seen a crysalis. Karen

Too too cute Cat! What big eyes that wee one has!!

~Deb

Thanks Fly. Not being the "engineer" so to speak, I'm not sure if I could do what you've suggested or not. I'll have to give that some thought.

That photo above was taken right after we set up the cage, so it was still empty. I took a photo just a bit ago with activity in the cage.

He is beautiful Cat. Just another shining example of God's magnificent handiwork!

Hard to believe how clear that photo is. I can even see your fingerprints in that shot! HAHAHA

Great job Janet and Connie!! Very nice cage! (claps)

Sheila I have plenty of Rue out there if you run low, just call me and I will take one to you bc nothing is eating it...all my BST cats are eating Parsley.


Deb

What an adorable little butterfly - Considering the size of the chrysalis, how large are the caterpillars? How did you even find them? It is obvious that you are a serious farmer!

And the cage is so professional - perhaps, with all of the great suggestions & enthusiasm, you could post your work on another site - to help others with butterfly farming. The cages & the experiences posted here are invaluable~

Great cage UniQue!!! Those inverted wire baskets work great - the caterpillars seem to enjoy crawling all over them...sort of like a mini jungle gym!!!


The caterpillars are about 1/4 inch to 3/5 inch long. Still very tiny...and easily lost amongst the foliage of a plant. Had to use a magnifying glass to even find the eggs!!!

~ Cat

Thanks! Yes, I saw that in one of the threads and I happened to have one that had no plant in it. They do seem to enjoy scooting along those wires. I've made sure that some of the PV's drape over it just in case they get hungry in their travels - like.....drive thru windows?

Janet

Here is the really big BST out there now(about 2 1/2" all stretched out. They are on some Parsley I got at 'that place' Paige mentioned up ^^ in the posts, however they seem to be healthy so far out in the air. They loved the almost 2" of rain we had too.

Yep the odds are stacked, I get a little nervous about all the same things as you all do.


Talk about your hungry hungry hippo, LOL>>

Cat, that little blue is so cute!

Those BST cats are beautiful, he looks bigger than the Monarch cats.

Cat- Great photo of little blue! All the photos are great everyone! So much fun to see everyone's butterflies and cats!

Okay...our weather was lousy today...49 degrees...can you believe it?! Yesterday was warm and sunny and then this yucky weather again. Oh well, I spent some of my time indoors constructively. I made more cat cages. Made six square ones as in this photo and the two round ones as in the next posting photo.

Got my heart set on finding some caterpillars of the larger moths and some not so common butterflies this coming Spring.

~ Cat

Here's a photo of the two round ones. I recycled "Pup Corn" doggie treat containers to make these.

~ Cat

Cat - What a great idea! Leave it to you to come up with some neat ideas! I am still going to try your trellis out of livestock fencing. And I'm going to weight it with concrete feet!

Yeah Cat those are great little cat cages! What kind of glue did you use to attach the mesh?

;-)

Deb,

I use hot glue. I dab it on the mesh fabric to hold it in place then I go back and squeeze out a thick line of it also folding over the edges of the mesh fabric into the glue to seal them.

I then slowly rub the side of glue gun's tip over the line of glue - the hot side of the tip reheats the glue enough to smooth it out. This is just for my benefit to make it look pretty :o)

Whenever I cut holes out of the sides of a container I put the mesh fabric on the outside. When I cut holes on the lids I put it on the inside. The caterpilars will crawl over the glue to hang from the mesh so it really doesn't matter I guess.

The hardest part is cutting holes out of some of those plastic container lids and sides. I use an xacto knife for most of the thinner ones but when I use those big rubber maid containers that are thicker plastic the dremmel tool saw blade gets put to use. Either that or I light a candle and periodically heat the xacto knife blade and make the cuts by melting my way through the plastic.

I still love using my store bought reptarium...it's a 22 gallon size and I prefer to put the last instar caterpillars in that simply because when the butterflies emerge they will have plenty of room to flit around and stretch their wings and they can easily cling to the mesh and rest there. Still have plans to make some bigger cages like those made of wood and screen like the one Unique posted photos of. Something that would stand on it's own like those old fashioned kitchen cupboards. :o)

I like using the mid-sized ones I make out of recycled dog treat containers and plastic food storage for the other instars as they are easier to move around and clean.

Oh, I really wish this weather would warm up!!! It's back down to 50 degrees! UGH!!! And yes, I know 50 is probably a warm front for some of ya'll up north who see below zero weather this time of year...but hey, we consider anything below 60 cold down here...we're not used to it...and neither are our butterflies. BRRRRRR!!! :o)
~ Cat

Thanks for the instructions Cat, that helps a lot! I will probably make some of those for myself. Since I added so many host plants this year I will need to have some handy.

and Janet's (Unique) cages are super duper too! My SIL is very handy and I might get him to make me something like that too.

Deb

I've enjoyed looking at all the creative ideas for building cat houses. You all got me thinking of what I might be able to use.
I'm thinking of using an old mini plastic greenhouse minus the plastic. Actually the mice shredded my plastic last year. I was thinking of using the frame and putting some type of mesh around it. The shelves will work for holding the plants and also for the chrysalis.

Here is a picture of one of these mini greenhouses from T&M. Mine is one shelf less. I'm not a great sewer, but should be able to put in a simple zipper for the entrance.
What would you suggest I use as the mesh? Remember, I will have to be able to sew a zipper onto it.

Appreciate any ideas.
toofew~

Too Few,

I have several of those little greenhouses I use for starting seeds etc. They would work as cat houses but you will run the risk of cats crawling out through the bottom as well as spiders, lizards and other predators crawling in...unless you encased the whole thing in mesh fabric.

A wandering caterpillar might also get squished between the framework and the fabric unless you use pvc clips to keep the fabric from moving. (like the kind that come with the reptariums).

I often use tulle fabric as well as that replacement screen for windows - it seems to be a blend of fiber with a rubber coating??? Am not sure what it's made of but I can easily cut it with scissors and I use it on the lids and sides of the cat cages I make out of recycled plastic containers.

...I've also used those greenhouses to set my cat houses in on the back porch. I leave the front flap open to allow the air to circulate.

~ Cat

Thanks Cat.
Especially for the thought of keeping the mesh from crushing the cats. I never would have thought of that.
I was planning on enclosing the whole thing is the mesh .... somehow.
Never seen a lizard here, but do have the many spiders and the occasional snake.

I like the idea of a 'mesh fabric' since I would like to be able to fold it up and put it all away. I guess I'll have to take a trip to Joanne's and take a look.

toofew~

Too Few...

Do share photos if you do make your greenhouse into a cat cage.

Lots of us have those greenhouses - and overtime the weather or varmits have damaged the plastic covering...so recycling it into a good sized cat cage would be great!

~ Cat

Too Few, maybe you could put a solid bottom with screws, etc. Then make the net cover with sealed seams to drop over the top, and at the bottom use velcro pieces to connect to the underside of the solid bottom.
As for the access door, a wide overlap with velcro might do the trick there too. Or you could opt for small openings for each shelf like I did here on my pvc BF house. http://davesgarden.com/forums/p.php?pid=2817196
Whatever you do please post your ideas here, we are all interested in new ideas.

I used an aquarium/terrarium with a metal mesh-screen top that I'd bought for a lizard while my grandson was at our house one time. I found caterpillars on my Hibiscus out in front then found out they were IO moth cats. My DH & I were concerned about them being eaten so we set up the old aquarium for them. I cleaned some small yogurt tubs then cut out four X marks on the top of the lid, put water in them, then shoved branches of the host plant, Hibiscus, into them for feeding material. Here's a pic of the cats when they were fattening up.

GREAT cages & ideas given.

I'd like to see a thread started of a collection of what the eggs, caterpillars, crysalis then end product butterfly/moth. I don't even know of a book like that! I'd buy it if I knew of one.

~*~ Suenell

This message was edited Feb 22, 2007 11:55 AM

Great pic Cambium!

The Bug Files are starting to get good pics of all stages, you could submit that photo.

Many field guides will have all stages. Mine has only 120 common N.A. eggs, cats, and adult photos, but they are drawn, not actual photographs:(

I think some others have great books, seems like I remember them posting in the past, hopefully they'll let you know.

This message was edited Feb 22, 2007 12:55 PM

Awesome IO cats!!! I had no idea they used hibiscus as a larval host. I've only seen IO cats out in the wooded areas.

Thanks for sharing!!! Don't forget to share moth photos when they emerge too :o)

~ Cat

Kewl ok I shared the pic along with a comment about the Hibiscus bushes. I'll also take a pic of the weird cocoons too. None of them are alike. Thanks for the compliments & prompting me to share the pic for our files.

~*~ Suenell

I recently purchased an wood burning/craft tool by Wood Hollow...it works wonders!!! It has a variety of tips that heat up when it's . ..makes it so easy to

Adding more photos of other cat cages I've made in anticipation of a busy Fall season :o)


This was made out of a plastic trash can with a snap on lid.

~ Cat

...and here's the lid.

~ Cat

another big container with a simple snap on lid.

~ Cat

The lid... ~ Cat

...can't remember...I think this was a cookie jar or container of doggie treats :o)

~ Cat

Cat - ROFL!!! You are crackin' me up!!!! Are ya on a roll or what with the cat cages??? Now ..... I wanna know ..... how in the heck are ya gonna clean out and feed all the cats that you plan to fill those cages with???? ROTFL!!!! You're gonna need to hire someone just to help ya out!!!! I think you need to be paid for what you are doin'! All the cages, cats, butterflies, photos, documentation, etc..... come on now .... someone needs to HIRE you quick! Ya got it all goin' on there, girlfriend!!!

Great shots of your new cages Cat!!

Cat, I believe you could sell those on ebay if the mood struck you,that's how good they look.You could probably sell them with plants included.Ah! forgot who needs another full time job,(sorry)

This message was edited Jun 20, 2007 10:50 AM