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garden_isle_dave

Have you seen this bug, Kauai?

garden_isle_dave
15 years ago

Have you seen this on Kauai?

I originally found them a little over a year ago in Kilauea, Kauai but have since found them in Moloaa as well.

It's a species of stick insect I identified about 9 months ago as an introduced species, originally from Madagascar. "The Pink-Winged/Madagascan" stick insect (Sipyloidea sipylus). Some of it's host plants include Bramble, Hawthorne, Raspberry, Eucalyptus, Oak (They seem to really like this )and Rose. Any of this growing in your yard and being damaged overnight?

I started breeding (no I didn't release them afterwards!) and taking notes on them, photographs, videos, etc. and contacted the Bishop Museum's Entomology Department. The curator of the insect archives told me congragulations, I had indeed identified a new species for Kauai, and that a similar, or possibly the very same species, had been found by a family on the Big Island. An email or two back and forth, and the subject was dropped with nothing done further. I read an article a long while back about the stick insect, which had apparently been found by someone else and reported, and never really thought about it again.

I just pulled out my old notes, photos, vids, and preserved specimens; and want to check back into it.

Has anyone anywhere else on the island spotted, captured, or taken photos of these? If so please contact me when you get the chance, I'd like to see how many sightings there have been and gather as much information as possible.

Aloha for now and mahalo in advance,

~David

Here is a link that might be useful:

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