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I just orderd some Large Copper larvae from WWB and want ot breed them outdoors when they hatch from pupae. I want to create a outdoor breeding area/ fight cage and need to know how to create the area in my garden to suit them. Could anyone help?

What flowers could I use? Rotting fruit on a stand? Would the copper lay on common dock?

Any help would be good and I will create a video on this.

Thanks in advance,

Dave

Purple Loostrife ? is a favourite nectar plant for this bug. A visual delight to see them feeding on it. The imagines will readily pair in a large breeding cage over a potted Great Water Dock. ALWAYS use Great Water Dock if you want to successfully overwinter the hibernating larvae.

Common dock leaves in winter do not provide a reliable and stable environment for the little hibernating larvae. When they die off and curl up at the end of season, the Great Water Dock leaves are much more tougher and thus more suitable to provide a secure hibernating site for the small larvae. Ordinary dock leaves in winter are much more prone to go limp and then mould appears which is very harmful to the hibernating larvae.

Get breeding conditions right, and come spring when the little larvae reappear on the growing Great Water Dock, you may find you have far more larvae than you bargained for. One year I had in excess of 1000 larvae appear in spring.... Feeding a tenth of that number to full and healthy maturity ( essential if you wish to continue another generation ) is a lot of preparation and work ... the mind boggles to cater for a larger number ...

Thansk, that sounds great. Orderd 10 larvae from WWb so they should arrive soon. Love to see results. getting Great Water Dock and regular dock.

Purple Loostrife sounds like a great idea. Getting 6 memters of netting and building a large outdoor breeding cage. WWB said if the cage was too large the adults would fly away from eachother and not breed.

Dave McCormick wrote:Thansk, that sounds great. Orderd 10 larvae from WWb so they should arrive soon. Love to see results. getting Great Water Dock and regular dock.

Purple Loostrife sounds like a great idea. Getting 6 memters of netting and building a large outdoor breeding cage. WWB said if the cage was too large the adults would fly away from eachother and not breed.

Provided they have been reared properly, thus mature and suitable for breeding, the adults will fly and pair even in a large unheated greenhouse ( comprehensively shaded and ventillated to keep excessive heat/sunshine away ) .

Got some great water dock seeds and orderd some Hemp Aginmony seeds, shoud be good to use and also growing regular common dock and foxglove. Orderd 6m netting too.

Not getting until July. 30. Anyway, how long does water dock take to grow? I planted it around 3 weeks or so ago.

Would curly leaf dock work for feeding the larvae? Does curly leaf have the same problem as common dock in winter?

Great Water dock seeds can be 'chipped' to accelerate their germination. I seem to remember using a file on them which worked. They really need to be overwintered outside in compost as exposure to low temperatures stimulate seed germination and growth is rapid once they start. Stratification I believe it's called.

If you have any disused canals or slow moving ditches or water courses nearby, cut a piece of rootstock with a leaf or two showing and pot that up. Stand the large pot in a bowl of water for best results. The plant usually grows in saturated conditions and can grow to a much larger size than the common docks. If you plan to successfully overwinter larvae, Great Water Dock is almost essential for best results.

Look after a rootstock and the plant will last for years and grow to huge size with massive leaves. I used a commercial compost from Garden Centres for my potted Docks.

By the way ... Ref Curly Leafed Dock ... do not confuse the similar leaves of Horse Raddish with Docks ...

I will try out that suggestion, cheers.
btw, does great water dock grow in the wild anwhere in UK? Would large copper larvae actually eat curly leaf dock?

Great water dock does grow naturally in the UK particularly the east of England. LC's would use this for foodplant in the wild even though the larvae accept other docks in captivity.

Thanks. My water dock is growing very well, always drenched in water. Won't be fully grown this year I don't think, so other docks will have to do.