griffincat

Being new to the hobby, I was immediately drawn to foreign sellers selling big exotic beetles. I contacted a couple and was told they could send anything I wanted to me in the US. I later learned that these beetles were illegal for me to import so I steered clear. My question is: are these people actually sending and getting away with illegal importing? Or do they simply charge you for them, send them, and know customs will seize them?

Dynastes Granti and Dynastes Tityus are the two beetles I am interested in starting with. I have some adults of one and some larvae of another located and am working on getting them here. I am just worried about getting them, and like a new parent at first, not knowing what to do or where to start. How do you know when the substrate and or food are working OK? Are there signs of things going bad? I will be working on substrate over the weekend. I am not sure if I can get decayed oak, but am reasonably sure that decayed birch is available. Worst case scenario, I can get oak leaves and make something up. Thinking of using a 15 gallon fish tank to start with.

Hi Guys, I just joined here and this will be my first post. I recently got interested in large beetles and while the exotics look very cool and very large, there seems to be much more legal issues and issues with scams outside the country, which brought me here. I like the two larger species of beetles availabel in US, and consider it a wonderful place to start and learn. I am trying to learn as much as I can and be able to dive in and start trying to raise and breed beetles both for my own enjoyment and to share with my son's school. From my personal standpoint, I can certainly ask lots of beginner questions, but am a little afraid of boring all of you here. It would be great to see more photos and expanations of how you guys are setting up your habitats for breeding, etc. Also while I am here, I have had one thought recently. When an adult beetle dies, does it whither away and look bad, or do they just tip over in great physical looking condition and then become a mounted specimen? Also are people that mount specimens whaiting for them to die, or are they helped along in order to get a clean mount faster??