Silkmoths and more: Dogoia (Goodia) lunata

The highlight of this year's rearing has arrived: the African Dogoia lunata! Such a rare opportunity. Not many people have ever had the chance to breed something this beautiful (and I may have exaggerated a little with the pictures). You may know them better by their old name Goodia lunata. Little was known about the early stages. There are some old(er) records of them feeding on Aframomum and Amomum (Zingiberaceae) and an unspecified Ficus (Moraceae). I doubt very much that these records are correct. The caterpillars immediately (without any hesitation) started to feed on Robinia pseudoacacia (Fabaceae), which makes it a lot more likely that the wild host is another tree/shrub out of the Legume family. It would not be the first time that these old records turn out to be wrong.

The rearing is surprisingly easy, at an average living room temperature. Keep them in relatively small, well ventilated plastic containers. They grow fast. From hatchling to ready to pupate takes approximately one months. From the third instar on, it will seem that you're rearing two different species. Lunata has two very distinct larval forms. One densely haired, black and orange brown form and one black to dark blood red form with sparse white hairs.They remain more or less the same in the fourth instar, but in the last instar the color comes closer together although two clearly distinct forms remain. One with an orange brown body and fewer white hairs (which grows a little larger and are probably the females) and one with a black body and dense orange hair (the males?). Don't touch the larvae! The hairs are urticating and the sting is as bad as that of some Automeris. The thin and open cocoon is spun between some leaves, not at the bottom of the container as one would expect with a species out of the Micragonini tribe, but as high as possible.