Eastern Hercules Beetle:

Back over 40 years ago I could find dead hercules beetles hanging onto the bark of a tree, but now I haven`t seen any in my area for years.
I`m not sure what the reason are but my thoughts lean towards habitat problems.
Anyone have these beetles in the wild?
Insect Rod,,

Well, I have seen a lot of different insect species come and go in my area. If I had to guess it is just in your area, because of the conditions. I know it sure is sad though. The monarch butterfly once was very common in my area. I used to collect the caterpillars, but they are getting harder and harder to find all the time.

I've been finding them in decent numbers around lights in Prince George county Maryland. I'm currently rearing them from wild collected adults from that county.

Cool, I have been looking into getting some. Are they a difficult species to care for?

They are fairly easy to rear. The most difficult thing is making sure you have enough substrate to rear them to pupation. If you happen to live in or close to oak forest land then it should be easy to gather enough.

Very interesting that you rear this beetle. How long do the adults live? We have plenty of oak forest but no beetles that I can find.
Wish I new a way to introduce some back into the wild. Around the same time is when the lubber grasshoppers seem to have vanished in my area.
insect rod

Captive bred adults can live 6 months to a year if they're kept properly. They may not naturally occur in your area.

Ok thanks for the captive life span. At one time we did have Dynastes tityus, they were like you could find a few sometimes but that was many years ago. A few could still be around that i`m not aware of. The pesticides poison from the large farming practices may have something to do with it.
I did view a pinned e hercules last year that was found in a town 40 miles from me.

When you have time could you post some pictures of yours?
insect rod

How do you attach photos to a reply?

Scroll down to the box down below your reply, you should see a horizontal section at the top, from left to right count to #13 for host an image.
insect rod

Nathan wrote:How do you attach photos to a reply?

you can do it this way through imgur http://www.insectboards.com/t21-attachments

Or if you are posting an image from a computer file you just click the next choice over from insert a image to "host an image" and do it that way.

Not having any luck!

Does not work for me very well either, some glitch problem or something. The forum needs to take a close look at this problem. Never have this problem over the years.
insect rod

Insect Rod and Nathan. I am sorry you guys are having troube with this. Let me thoroughly look into this.

My Dynastes tityus were fun to play with. They were wild caught so they lived about 2 months in captivity. Not sure if I ever got any eggs out of them; I didn't have them in the best soil to lay in.

I don't know how this will turn out, but here are photos of my captive reared D. tityus.

That is a nice looking male and some very good photo`s. I wonder if you could take the eggs and introduce them back into the wild in the proper soil mixture?
insect rod

I see you got the photos working! Any more troubles? Also very nice pictures.

Thanks, it works!

I am very impressed! I have always wanted to rear these and also the lucanids.
Your dark form poly is AWESOME! did you find it? I have only seen one picture like it ever.

Thanks! I've been rearing the dark polys for 4 years now. The morph showed up in my captive stock in 2014. As far as I know the dark morph is mentioned a few times in literature. There was a short article in an old Lep. Society magazine I read about a dark female specimen obtained from a cocoon. It may be the only other dark poly morph under glass besides mine. They are very easy to duplicate as a pairing of two darks gives you all dark offspring, but the females aren't very fertile. Very cool moth to work with!

As far as the beetles I've had a lot of fun playing around with them. I have around thirty adults in hibernation now and 100 or so L2's.

Insect Rod wrote:That is a nice looking male and some very good photo`s. I wonder if you could take the eggs and introduce them back into the wild in the proper soil mixture?
insect rod

It would probably be easier releasing mated females into suitable habitat.

I do need to take a look at this possibility.
insect rod

Nathan wrote:Thanks! I've been rearing the dark polys for 4 years now. The morph showed up in my captive stock in 2014. As far as I know the dark morph is mentioned a few times in literature. There was a short article in an old Lep. Society magazine I read about a dark female specimen obtained from a cocoon. It may be the only other dark poly morph under glass besides mine. They are very easy to duplicate as a pairing of two darks gives you all dark offspring, but the females aren't very fertile. Very cool moth to work with!

As far as the beetles I've had a lot of fun playing around with them. I have around thirty adults in hibernation now and 100 or so L2's.

Cool! Would there be any chance of me getting some ova in the spring?
I have gotten some dark strains but not that black.
How long is the life cycle for the tityus? Have you ever raised D. granti?

mothman27 wrote:

Nathan wrote:Thanks! I've been rearing the dark polys for 4 years now. The morph showed up in my captive stock in 2014. As far as I know the dark morph is mentioned a few times in literature. There was a short article in an old Lep. Society magazine I read about a dark female specimen obtained from a cocoon. It may be the only other dark poly morph under glass besides mine. They are very easy to duplicate as a pairing of two darks gives you all dark offspring, but the females aren't very fertile. Very cool moth to work with!

As far as the beetles I've had a lot of fun playing around with them. I have around thirty adults in hibernation now and 100 or so L2's.

Cool! Would there be any chance of me getting some ova in the spring?
I have gotten some dark strains but not that black.
How long is the life cycle for the tityus? Have you ever raised D. granti?

I probably won't have enough of the dark poly ovae to spare. Most of the females only lay a few dozen eggs and many are sterile. Last year I didn't get any fertile dark to dark pairings. Hopefully the dark to normal (het for dark) pairings I reared from will give me some dark adults this Spring. If not then the line is lost!

Back to beetles, my tityus go from egg to adult in about 15 months. I have my first granti ovae and larvae now.