# Can some one show me a pic of a male female p paradoxa?



## Mike (May 13, 2006)

I have some p.paradoxa and they are L4-L5 i can tell with some of them but most of them i cant tell wheither they are male or female? I lost the cord for my digi cam to hook up to the comp so i cant show you pics. Can some one take pics of there mantis abdomen and show me male from female again they are L4-L5.


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## Rick (May 13, 2006)

Adults are easy to tell on any mantis. But for nymphs look at the underside of your mantids abdomens. If they have seven or more sections it's a male. If it has six sections it's a female.


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## Mike (May 13, 2006)

K i get confused cuz near the tip there like these small ones. for example there is 6 segments then near the but there like small lines is that considerd segments?


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## 13ollox (May 13, 2006)

no .. just look at the clear distinct lines ! wrong mantis but good picture to show you what i mean ! this is a female







Neil


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## Mike (May 13, 2006)

so the smaller lines near the end of the abdomen dont matter? cuz i can count the big lines easily then it starts getting into smaller 1-or 2 lines near the end? and d you count the tip as one segment?


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## nympho (May 13, 2006)

" If it has six sections it's a female"

im not sure thats strictly true. i have some heirodula nymphs i have been trying to sex and this is what ive noticed. when very small the males and females look very similar. Later, in females the first six segments grow to be about the same size. The sixth segments rear edge is a different shape from the others and overlaps and obscures some terminal segments, which are very small and narrow but seem to still there if you look closely, at least in these nymphs. They are just insignificant visually compared to the large sixth segment. In males the segments are very evenly tapered and the sixth one is only a little bigger than the last two segments.

I only mention this cos the rule that females have only six segments has caused me problems. in my L4 females I can count 7 or even 8 segments or at least more than the six big ones (its hard to see whats going on at the back there or what defines a segment). My females are still easily told from the males and they are definitely females.


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## Mike (May 13, 2006)

yes hmm thats what i was talking about thoes small annoying segments. the last 2 on them are very small so yea confusing sorta. 0_o hey another question are ghosts infrequent eaters? i know yen was feeding them flys, and i fed them crickets and they dont seem to like it, they eat half maybe and throw it away?


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## Rick (May 13, 2006)

Well the smaller they are the harder it is to tell. But at L4 or 5 it should be easy to tell. Count each line. The tip is also a segment.


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## Jay (May 13, 2006)

Mantisonline.de has some of the best information on this. Too bad most of it is in German. However, you can probably figure out the differences between males and females by looking at the pictures from the following links. The first link has a link at the bottom to a care sheet and pictures of P. paradoxas. Look at pictures GU-1 and GU-2 on the first link also. On the second one has more detailed pictures of the segments on males and females. Good luck!

http://www.mantisonline.de/deutsch/arten/p...rania/main.html

http://www.mantisonline.de/deutsch/allgeme...tpflanzung.html


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## Executor of Fruit Flies (May 14, 2006)

I've found sexing ghosts to be extremely easy; you don't even have to count segments. Just like d. dessicata, just look at their thorax hood. In both species, the female's hood is bigger and sort of hooks towards it's backside, while the male's hood is a narrower, unhooked diamond shape. When they get to adult, there's another indicator (not that you need to know now), since males' wings go past the abdomen, and females' don't.


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## Mike (May 14, 2006)

Ok thanks everyone ive sexed them!!! Yea when i first got them i tryed too see whats different about the hood cuz i used to breed dessicata and i couldnt see any difference until i got showed a pic now i can see the difference, thanks alot everyone for your help.


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