# Hey!



## mikey5050

Hi my name's Mike and im a student at a university in the UK. Ive just joined the forum because i got a pet mantis (african praying mantis) and he's acting a bit funny! my set up is as follows

- plastic tank (about 12cm W, 25cm L, 10cm H)

- heating mat which i put on at night (gets cold in my student house)

- soil substrate (only a few cm on the bottom)

- plastic plants

i keep the tank pretty humid and feed him these small black crickets (about 0.5cm long). My mantis' name is Boris.

When i got him the new black crickets he ate alot of them straight away and then stopped hunting and just hangs upside down from the tank all the time. I thought he might be about to shed so ive made sure he's still got a cricket or two in there but just left him to it, trouble is its been a week now and i dont think hes been hunting in all that time and he's still just hanging upside down all the time. When i have got him out and put him near to a cricket he has only at most just struck the cricket but im sure its not that they are too hard for him - he's eaten them before no problem, should i be concerned?

thanks very much  

Mike


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## timp

I'm no expert, in fact I only joined here very recently to learn about my mantis about which I knew only very little but my mantis did a very similar thing before the first time I ever saw it shed and I too was worried that he wasn't eating properly. I think I read that they will strike at things to scare them off if they are about to shed. Which uni are you at?


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## Rick

Welcome! African mantids tend to sit still most of the time.


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## mikey5050

Im at Nottingham Trent. What about u? Is it normal for them to not eat for a week though? i cant be sure he hasnt eaten to be honest but im pretty sure whenever i look at him he's just hanging upside down. What a life eh?


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## Rick

> Im at Nottingham Trent. What about u? Is it normal for them to not eat for a week though? i cant be sure he hasnt eaten to be honest but im pretty sure whenever i look at him he's just hanging upside down. What a life eh?


They are a really sedentary species staying in one spot most of the time. He's probably about to molt.


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## timp

Ahhh a fellow Nottingham person, I'm at University of Nottingham, what do you study?


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## Ian

Hey Mike,

Welcome to the forum!


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## mikey5050

I study chemistry, what about you? boris is back to normal now, think he just went through an odd phase - hasn't molted yet. Somthing well wicked happened the other day - i dropped a cricket in and it landed on his head but before it even touched his head he grabbed it out of the air and ate it! mantids are ace!


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## timp

I do computer science. Boris is a good name for a mantis, how old is he?


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