vabrou wrote: ↑Wed Apr 03, 2024 3:32 pm Chuck, I direct you to view our 30-year sphingids of Louisiana study. .... taken in fermenting bait traps included Sphinx kalmiae Neurn., Enyo lugubris (L.), Sphecodina abhottii (Swainson), A. floridensis, Darapsa myron, and Darapsa pholus (Cram.). We captured several specimens each of species not generally known to be attracted to fermenting bait were taken by this method, including Laothoe juglandis (J. E. Smith), Hemaris diffinis , Darapsa versicolor (Harr.), and Xylophones tersa (L.). S.

Thanks Vernon. That's the summary I was asking for. Unfortunately, I don't have enough time to read papers outside of my specific area of research. Job and family keep me busy, and with summer (MV season) coming I'll be pulling 4 hours of sleep a night for 90 days.

Pierre wrote: ↑Wed Apr 03, 2024 7:19 pm Confirmed by Patrick Arnaud, organizator of this fair.

Thank you Pierre, I have updated InsectNet Insect Fair agenda : https://www.insectnet.com/blog/insect-c ... nsect-fair

Unlike the USA, France is a collector friendly place. You have nothing to declare or fill on the French side (as long as you don't buy protected species).

If you want to mail it, you should better use the French post system called Colissimo (cheaper and less procedurial than DHL).
In the parcel declaration, you can write "dried dead lepidoptera for study".

Hello all!

Does anyone in the United States have any experience with purchasing insects at this fair and then importing them to the US? I would really like to go but I am not exactly sure about the process of exporting from France. Of course I would use my American import license and fill out a form 3-177. Would likely mail to myself with DHL. Unfortunately my French is very limited. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

While on the subject of Charaxes endemic to Madagascar, we should of course make mention of the rather large and spectacular species, C. andranodorus -


Source: https://wobam.co.uk/product/charaxes-an ... adagascar/


Source: https://wobam.co.uk/product/charaxes-an ... adagascar/

I find the word “typical” helpful in these situations. Typical, X is found at location Y.

A pair of Charaxes cacuthis collected in Madagascar in 2000.
Don't think these are particularly rare but thought they were worth posting in this thread anyway. This is the only pair in my collection. Shown upperside & underside.

Confirmed by Patrick Arnaud, organizator of this fair.

Here's a second pic just in case the first one is not clear. It could be the same or a second moth but it most likely is the same one.

This moth always shows up at our house at this time of the year during a significant day in the Chinese calendar. But out of curiosity, what moth species/type is this? Either it could really be a reincarnated relative or it is just that certain moths have a migration pattern during this time of the year. (This pic was taken at my house in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia)

Thanks thus far for the input.

I'm rather caught in the middle- I like to keep things short, which at times requires the reader's understanding that there are exceptions.

If I have to write something like "chances of finding Papilio multicaudata east of the Mississippi are .00001%" for every instance when a "fact" is presented then a paper would double in size without adding any real value.

Even something so simple as "flight period June-August" infers that there are no adults on the wing in September, while in fact one might see one per year the first few days of September. Must such a thing be accounted for? We as scientists KNOW there are outliers in virtually every case; the end of the bell curve is miniscule.

Newly released, the first publication to specifically address the known species of Fulgoridae (sensu stricto) for the state of Louisiana.

Freely accessible link:
https://www.academia.edu/117030842/Fulg ... _Louisiana

I can safely proclaim that 'virtually everyone' is guilty of using 'absolutes'. People write in the same mannerisms they do when speaking. I am certainly guilty of doing these things, though I am aware of the prevalence of this affliction and when writing make an attempt to eliminate doing this. I can say with 'absolute certainty' that I often fail.

One idiotic thing that even the most learned persons do is to say something is 1000% true. Once one has reached 100%, there is no more of anything beyond 100%. This is entirely different than saying something is 10 times as many e.g. 10 times 100 = 1000 (a quantity) which does not infer or result in 1000 (percent). I can proclaim with 'absolute certainty' that there are a few persons reading this do not comprehend this concept.

I can say with certainty and agree there are 'probably' exceptions to any proposed rules. Chuck, I watched a video where someone was 'running' from an out of control vacuum. An exception obviously.

I will end with that statement I often repeat: The only persons that don't make mistakes are those that do not do anything. Now this is a 100% certainty, then maybe not.

I note that novice collectors often go out light trapping 2-3 days in a year and afterward make foolish BS statements publicly based upon their meaningless experiences. Even though I have operated all of insect traps for nearly 50 million trap hours, I cannot with certainty make some proclamations as an absolute. Such statement have to have some limiting criteria. Another example is in our N.A. scientific literature for the past near two centuries is the repeatedly plagiarized statements concerning how many broods of lepidoptera species exists. Nearly all of these statements do not have have any limiting criteria. e.g. someone reporting a species in Canada only has one annual brood and makes such a proclamation without clarifying that occurred in Canada (this is how our scientific literature reads). But that same species here in Louisiana may have 11 or more annual broods. Here in Louisiana are several agricultural noctuid pest species which have 13 annual broods, How can that be? 13 broods X 28 days each = 364 days.

Pierre wrote: ↑Sat Mar 09, 2024 8:09 am Confirmed: september 28 / 29, 2024

Hello
Could I please know who has confirmed the dates, because I can't find information other than what you have provided.
And I wanted to make sure before buying the trip.
Thank you.

Yes, there are exceptions to virtually everything. I think people use "figures of speech" and that's where "absolutes" pop up. For instance,
the old saying is the only certainties in life are death and taxes, I would argue that taxes are not a certainty, and we can only count on expiration.
An interesting observation, and an issue fixed with proper language and grammar, in their correct context.

Chuck, I direct you to view our 30-year sphingids of Louisiana study. We published the results from the first 26 years about 27 years ago (1997). Later we followed up with captures taken in four additional years completing 30 total years which covered the years (1970-1999) in which we reported personally capturing 83,889 wild adult Sphingidae specimens representing 46 species within the state of Louisiana. Among these was the discoveries of two new species of sphingidae right here at our home location. All of our traps operated continuously 24 hours daily/nightly non-stop. And consider these same traps and more are still running continuously here, in our 55th year of nonstop light trapping (and operating numerous other types of insect traps).

To answer your question you will find what species was captured at UV light and which species were attracted to bait in that study. We captured e.g. all the normally considered dayflying species of hawk-moths occurring in Louisiana using our UV light traps (night collecting). From our 26-year portion publication we reported species more often taken in fermenting bait traps included Sphinx kalmiae Neurn., Enyo lugubris (L.), Sphecodina abhottii (Swainson), A. floridensis, Darapsa myron, and Darapsa pholus (Cram.). We captured several specimens each of species not generally known to be attracted to fermenting bait were taken by this method, including Laothoe juglandis (J. E. Smith), Hemaris diffinis , Darapsa versicolor (Harr.), and Xylophones tersa (L.). Several Agrius cingulata (F.) and Amphion floridensis were captured in pitfall traps baited with a mixture of human feces, water, and ethylene glycol. Interesting about L. juglandis as adults of this species have been incorrectly reported in the past scientific literature as having non-functioning feeding mouth parts.

Our bait recipes included any an all available fruits of the week (whatever was available to us at any given moment), e.g. bananas, peaches, apples, pears, apricots, cherries, blueberries..... were more readily available These were blended along with granulated sugar and/or cane syrup, etc.... and added cheap regular strength alcohol beer. Never use light beer and never, never, never use honey as it will immediately destroy your bait. We placed the blended bait into used plastic empty milk jugs which allowed easy handling and easily poured bait. The attached photo shows a series of a bi-colored cerambycid beetle (Purpuricenus axillaris Haldeman) which all were captured using banana baits only, none by any other trap methods or any other baits. Showing that experimentation produces unexpected results. Here is another cerambycidae I captured using fermenting fruit bait: Plinthocoelium suaveolens (Linnaeus)

While I'm thing about pouring bait, this same concept works exceptionally well for using (human) dung- easily handled using funnels and easily poured at trap locations using non-chlorinated water pre-added to the dung and then stored for use. NEVER< NEVER< NEVER tightly close lids on any fermenting baits, including especially dung. Never ever store fermenting fruit or fresh dung inside of your home or any buildings.

Here are the three free access links to our Sphingidae of Louisiana publications:
https://www.academia.edu/232102/Distrib ... Sphingidae
https://www.academia.edu/1021607/Addend ... _Louisiana
https://www.academia.edu/1509724/Second ... _Louisiana

and many others can be found on that same site freely accessible. https://independent.academia.edu/VernonAntoineBrouJr

The use of absolutes bothers me because there are no absolute certainties in nature, although many things come close. When a meteorologist says that there is a 100% chance of rain, he knows it's never that certain but close enough that his forecast will most likely come true. It would be more accurate to say 99% or 1% rather than 100% or 0%. If you buy a lottery ticket and believe that you have a chance to win, you do. But that chance is so small that it might as well be zero. However, if the odds of winning were advertised as zero, nobody (correction: almost nobody) would buy tickets. If there is ambiguity in a claim (Papilio multicaudata is only found west of the Mississippi), maybe it should say "chances of finding Papilio multicaudata east of the Mississippi are .00001%." The word "only" is thus avoided.

I was asked what does the inside of the collection chamber look like. Here is a photo from my files where lid is removed after 24 hours of collecting. Specimens on tray allows for quick visual selection and removal from trap. Those specimens not selected are dumped from tray. If dumped insects nearby continuously throughout the year will result in attracting more insects to the area, some species of butterflies are especially attracted to the decaying insects.

Lid is glass. Reason for glass is so captured insects see bright light and go to it assuming that is an exit. This concept works exceptionally well. The circular tray holding captures easily lifts out, and under the tray is the NaCn killing agent. What was most surprising is the addition of the 1/4" mesh hardware cloth to the outer diameter of the wooden circular tray prevented 99+% of the tiniest insects from passing through this mesh. This same 1/4" mesh flexible hardware cloth is also the perfect material to create the inverted funnel attached to the bottom of the collection chamber (see image).

The outer (white) rings are obtained buy cutting rings out of 50 gallon plastic drums. I do not recommend smaller diameter ring. I experimented several times using smaller diameter rings - poor results.

Top image from about 40 years ago illustrates live capture bait trap (A) next to two early iterations of my bait traps with attached collection chambers (B and C). In all three of these (A,B,C) the screen material is flexible fiberglass 1/8" mesh. Never use steel or aluminum or plastic coated steel as screening material. The steel will rust away and the aluminum is easily chewed by wasps. When used, steel zippers with rust away.

Vernon, what types of Sphingids do you get at bait traps? What do they like best? Thanks.

FYI---- Every aspect (components and numbers of components and sizes of the components) of my trap designs have important and necessary purposes for handling, operating and the best performance results. Due to the fact that I worked as a Quality Assurance/Quality control Engineer most of my early life, I design everything on paper before I begin to actually construct something. Think about your design and how to improve results before construction. The size of my traps allows a large surface area for bait to evaporate, this is how one can attract and capture thousands of butterflies, thousands of hawk-moths, thousands of Catocala, etc., each year. If your bait surface area is coffee-cup size, then your results will be coffee cup size. If you want to capture specimens with 6-10" wingspans, then the access hole/spaces need to allow such entry. If dimensions followed exactly as shown this specific trap design, it allows the captures to be easily hand-removed without dismantling the trap (access using full length plastic trap side zipper), it allows access to the entire bait area by lifting trap bottom hook with a finger or two (left hand) - refresh bait using bait jug (right hand), and re-hook all in less than 30-60 seconds. My traps have operated for over a decade several periods over the past half century without ever removing them even once 24 hours daily 365-366 days/year. After you build you first trap, build ten more. Your gonna need help with all the captured insects. As you will also capture lots of cerambycidae and other coleoptera. There are other considerations about successful results with trapping, e.g., always place traps in tree shaded (=bait shaded) locations, refresh bait (add more to containers) daily or every other day, remove captures once or twice daily, stay away from areas with lots of concrete. Protect traps from foxes, squirrels, snakes, lizards, horses, cattle, etc. Be on the lookout for the worse trap pest of all-- the two-legged variety. (the climate change and save the whale wackos will destroy and steal your traps), these fools are mental midgets and only purpose in life is to stop your scientifically valuable activities and in the process, destroy everything you have. When I have run traps in public access areas for nearly 50 years, I always hide them among heavy and hard to access vegetation, though when fall and winter weather arrives you traps may no longer be hidden. If you run a bunch of traps be prepared to purchase cases of fruit, large quantities of sugar and cane syrup, and lots of cheap beer. Do not discontinue any of your traps, they will capture insects 24-hours daily in temps 35F-45F and above, higher temps = more bugs.

You can also place other types of traps nearby your bait traps e.g., light traps, semiochemical lure traps , dung beetle traps, on and on..... This is how I ended up running ~500 insect traps over the past half century. This way you can run these multiple traps more efficiently (time-wise) 4-5 traps at a time instead of one trap at a location stop. Using bait traps allowed capture of as many as 500+ butterflies or 500+ catocala per trap, per day, during the warmer months without the presence of the collector.

If you plan on running a lot of bait traps over many years, consider what i did early on, I planted 160+ fruit trees: apple, pears, peaches, plums, etc.....so I could have easy no-cost access to bait. As a consequence, it also supplied considerable fresh fruit for my family and friends for decades.

Attached photo is one of my many automatic capture bait traps here at my home in Louisiana. This trap uses cyanide for dispatching all insects of any type entering the trap 24 hours daily, thus resulting in the highest possible quality specimens without the presence of the collector, except to pick up the results. Except for some live-capture bait traps, I have incorporated ethyl acetate or Sodium cyanide as a dispatching agent in >95% of the 500 insect traps I have operated. This type of trapping allowed me to be employed full time, have a family, go to college, publish 654 entomological research papers using the specimens I collected, and my wife and I have discovered over 400 species of moths new to science (our target insects), and I have a life without being involved in the time-consuming activities required using classical collecting methods.