Stagomantis Californica Female Sizes-Colours

Hello there! I'm new to the forum so thnx! It's the strangest, coolest thing but this summer in Burbank i have never seen so many Mantids! my Raised bed garden is like a Mantis magnet! There are at least two BIG females,one green, one camouflaged with black, purple brownish mottling etc. That will eat flies from tweezers and has a strong pull! And the third is a beige female Chinese Mantis i think my wife released about month ago & it must be at least 3" ! Hoping they don't all scrap! They're of a similar size ! Then last night i found yet another big green female nearby and i then have a juvenile Californica i rescued from the pool & spritzed off the chlorine but it only has one front leg & likes to eat cat food ,hamburger,flies etc. From my tweezers! it can't seem to catch any prey with its one leg..hoping it grows another leg after molt? I wonder if the captive secretes pheromones that other Mantids pick up on ? I suppose its more likely our pesticide free garden is so full of moths,flies, lacewings etc it's a good habitat for all sizes & colors of mantid . I released a hand raised Chinese male after my wife's urging but he was promptly eaten alive

By a deep green female so i'm hoping all these big females can coexist without going 'Battle Royale' and wonder when the males will appear? The ootheca i ordered from Mantis shop still hasn't hatched a month later and its been very ,very hot here! Can females coexist on same patch? Will different species mate? And the sizes of these female Californians are all at least 3+ " think they could tke the alligator lizard at the bottom of the garden ! Cheers from Burbankia-JPF

Im sry i posted this ramble twice! It's late, hope you had great Labour Day! Cheers

First picture is a S. limbata. What is the mantis in the second picture?

I thought it was a large female Stagomantis Californica? Thank you for your input! These are taken with iPad sry! but ill download camera shots where you can really see size of abdomen

Nice to see our wonderful native mantids. Hopefully the non-native Chinese doesn't eat them.

Beige color is a little unusual for Tenodera sinensis, but very common for Mantis religiosa. Are you sure the mantis your wife released was not a Tenodera sinensis? Mantis religiosa is probably more common than T. sinensis in California because there are more spottings of M. religiosa than T. sinensis on Bugguide in California. And I hear about Mantis religiosa from southern California by far more often than T. sinensis being there.

http://bugguide.net/node/view/22947/data

http://bugguide.net/node/view/10098/data

Those are cool mantises

Love S. limbata

Ooh! Large grasshopper. So are S. limbata more aggressive predators than S. carolina? My S. carolina are timid with large prey, especially if the prey gives a lot of struggle.

happy1892 said:

Ooh! Large grasshopper. So are S. limbata more aggressive predators than S. carolina? My S. carolina are timid with large prey, especially if the prey gives a lot of struggle.

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Mine didn't care what size the prey was.

Yeah, my Carolina mantises don't care about size either

I want one.. or two..or 20..LOL