Silkworm
By Shim Hyun-chul
Staff Reporter
Despite their repulsive appearance, silkworms provide people with cloth and nutritive elements.
The silkworm, the caterpillar of the silk moth, spins a cocoon of unbroken silk thread which is used in making healthy foods as well as cosmetics during its short 49-day lifespan.
Silkworms live purely only mulberry leaves and grow during their sleep. They only sleep about four times in their lives.
One silkworm can spin 1,000 to 1,500 meters of silk.
A newly born silkworm of about three millimeters, gains 10 thousands times its weight within 20 to 25 days. Five days of a silkworm’s life can be compared to a human’s one year, like the 7 years of a dog’s.
Silkworms are chiefly used for making silk thread. The making of silk started about 3,000 years ago in Korea and was developed by kings.
Between 1960 and 1970, the sericultural industry boomed in Korea but from 1980 it lost its position to cheaper Chinese products.
The Rural Development Administration will display silkworms at its building in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province until July 21 to help people better understand the lives of these incredible worms.
For more information, visit at www.rda.go.kr
