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A population of same aged thrips is created by placing fresh bean pods
in colony cages for 1-2 days and allowing thrips to lay eggs in the
beans. Beans are then removed from the colony and eggs allowed to
hatch in screened Gladware cages.
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Select colony cages in which to place fresh
beans. Remove all bean pods currently in those cages and transfer
them to other cages.
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Place 6-8 fresh bean pods in each cage.
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Remove bean pods 1-2 days later, leaving adults in the cage if
possible. The longer the beans are left in the cages, the more
variability there will be in ages of the thrips.
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| Dip beans in a 10% bleach solution for 1
min to remove first instars which may still be on the beans.
Rinse well with deionized water. |
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Dry beans with a paper towel. |
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| Split beans up between desired number of Gladware
containers, mixing beans from the colony cages. Several cages with
smaller numbers of thrips are easier to collect from than one container
with an extremely large population. |
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| Place Gladware in growth chamber to rear
insects. Sponges with honey may be added if desired to the cages
when eggs begin to hatch. Add bean pods and honey to cages as needed
until insects reach desired stage of life cycle. The thrips develop
from egg to adult in about 13 days. |
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