Saturday, September 24, 2016

Gelastocoris oculatus

Hey Again Everyone!
Last weekend, while me and my family were at Woodhaven Lakes(mostly fixing up our property a bit) we had a bit of time to go down to the lake where I had seen a good number of Gelastocoris oculatus( Big-eyed Toad Bugs.) Well, I was able to find nine of these cool little guys and brought them back with me to try an keep and hopefully breed.
I made them up an enclosure with a medium-sized deli cup as the water dish and some netting to climb back out of the water dish. I am using a very moist mix of coconut fiber, course sand, and fine-grained sand as the substrate.
Here's some pictures of these guys and their enclosure!


Adult G.oculatus enjoying some N.cinerea nymphs


G.oculatus nymphs

G.oculatus enclosure
I really love how much variation there is in color with this species, no two individuals really look exactly the same!So far most of them have readily taken small N.cinerea nymphs and also seem to be preying on the springtails in their enclosure, there has been no cannibalization, and one nymph molted to adulthood, so it's safe to say these guys have been doing pretty well in my care! I'll definitely keep you guys updated on this awesome little species of true bug.
Hope you guys enjoyed, and I'll see you all on my next post!

3 comments:

  1. Cool, glad they are feeding for you! Hope you are able to breed them! :)

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    1. Thank you :) Have you ever heard of anyone breeding these?

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    2. Orin might have, he wrote about them in his book, "Assassin Bugs, Waterscorpions and Other Hemiptera", but I can't remember if he said he bred them or not, and I don't have the book with me at the moment. I'm inclined to say he was successful in breeding them though.

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