What kind of moth?

E

ester

Guest
I bought these as "wax worms" from 2 different pet stores.
Features: the larvae never exceeded 2 cm in length, they never spun any silk, could not scale walls, did not eat beeswax, simply threw off their last skin to turn into a pupa. The moths don't really fly but whirr their wings and crawl around. These wax worms were sold on cardboard egg crates.

65986.jpg


Does anyone know what kind of moths these are?
They happily lived on crushed grains. The larvae look just like the greater wax moth larvae (they ARE a pain with all their silk), only smaller and less annoying.
 
Hi Ester, that's Galleria mellonella, the larger of the waxworms available commercially.

The lesser waxworm, Achroae grisella spins silk and is a smaller, more delicate looking larvae/moth. Lesser wax worm reproduce much faster than the larger ones in my experience.

Achroae grisella mating - the moths are only 1cm long. Presumably the male is the smaller of the two.
65990.jpg

A comparison of fully grown larvae of each species.
65991.jpg
 
The stupid thing is.. I bought another box of wax worms, these spin silk like there's no tomorrow, are twice as big in larval stage and eat beeswax. Something the others never did.

I guess I'll wait and see if I get eggs and what the larvae do.
 
You can get containers of wax moths that are contaminated with meal moths like the Indian Meal moth (Plodia interpunctella). For awhile a number of vendors of lesser waxmoths in the USA were selling the Indian Meal Moths as these has overrun the cultures.
Your comment about them feeding on grain makes me suspect that is what this species may be....

Ed
 
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