# That's my.....leg



## Woodbox (Jul 15, 2010)

I have been having a hard time catching flies around my area. I suspect the city sprayed something and that it affected my fly population which has been massive due to some strange berry dropping trees on my property. As such, today, I was desperate. Several small stink bug looking food items later, which mantids can't smell apparently, I found this lone grasshopper. I added him to a container but he jumped around too much. I put him in a bag and stunned him in the freezer. While taking him out with some 15 inch tweezers, his legs fell off. I really didn't mean to. They just come off easier after a quick freeze I guess. Anyway, again, being danger low on food items in my backyard (time to buy spikes for the first time) I'm not one to waste pieces of food either. If I catch a massive horsefly, which happens at least weekly on my porch, Ill divide it up amongst several mantids. After this mantis did not want the stunned hopper, I gave him a drumstick. It was then my wife came around the corner and looked at me as if I had stepped off a spaceship. She accused me of being evil for forcing the grasshopper to watch the mantis eat his own leg. I had not noticed but the hopper had come to and did appear to be watching the mantid eat his leg. (don't know if he knew it was his)  She told me to let it go after traumatizing it so much. (I fed it to another mantis when she went away) And yea, the leg is kicking in the mantids grasp.


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## lancaster1313 (Jul 15, 2010)

:lol: I don't think that it cared about the leg after dropping it. I think they drop legs easily to escape from predators. Good that you didn't let it go, with no jumping legs, it would have surely been eaten by something else anyway.


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## more_rayne (Jul 15, 2010)

lmao! That photo is priceless.


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## LauraMG (Jul 15, 2010)

I couldn't stop laughing at this picture! I LOVE IT!!!


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## Ghostie (Jul 15, 2010)

Hehe, Sorry, couldn't resist. :lol:


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## Vore (Jul 16, 2010)

Aw, poor grasshopper. You can actually SEE the confounded devastation in its eyes.


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## keri (Jul 16, 2010)

Wow, I wish we had such cute grasshoppers here!!


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## Rick (Jul 16, 2010)

Hahahahah :lol: If short on food, order fly pupa instead. Spikes are gonna make you wait.


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## hibiscusmile (Jul 16, 2010)

That was a good one, and I know just how she felt, I have done that before and it makes u feel like a heel! and U made Rick laugh, so u doing really good!


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## lancaster1313 (Jul 16, 2010)

It looks like a bird grasshopper nymph.


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## Woodbox (Jul 16, 2010)

glad everyone liked it.

Thanks for the advice. Pupae it is.

Not sure about the species. I left the grass around my garden untouched this year and I see them once and a while. There is another small katydid looking grasshopper that bites hard and then the occasional eastern lubber.

Has anybody ever fed the eastern lubber nymphs to mantids? When I see them, it's like jackpot. You always see them in little groups of a billion when they are little. Always been afraid to try. Bright color = gross or poison and they have fluorescent neon striping.


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## lancaster1313 (Jul 16, 2010)

Eastern lubbers are toxic. I don't know how that affects mantids, but I wouldn't offer them.


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## lancaster1313 (Jul 16, 2010)

Are you in Florida? It sounds like you find some of the same things that I do.


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## Woodbox (Jul 16, 2010)

Yep. NE Fla


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## Rick (Jul 17, 2010)

likebugs said:


> Eastern lubbers are toxic. I don't know how that affects mantids, but I wouldn't offer them.


Those are fine for mantis food. I find them here and they make excellent food. You can feed nearly any insect to a mantis. The few they can't eat they will know and drop.


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## lancaster1313 (Jul 17, 2010)

Rick said:


> Those are fine for mantis food. I find them here and they make excellent food. You can feed nearly any insect to a mantis. The few they can't eat they will know and drop.


That is good to know, those insects can be numerous when young. I guess I worry too much. The toxin must only work on some target predatory creatures.


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## Woodbox (Jul 17, 2010)

likebugs said:


> That is good to know, those insects can be numerous when young. I guess I worry too much. The toxin must only work on some target predatory creatures.


Makes sense the defense may not target all creatures. I add hot pepper powders to my birdseed to keeps squirrels away. Birds can't taste pepper. Mammals do.


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## lancaster1313 (Jul 20, 2010)

Woodbox said:


> Makes sense the defense may not target all creatures. I add hot pepper powders to my birdseed to keeps squirrels away. Birds can't taste pepper. Mammals do.


I watched a show about the horned lizard that squirts blood from its eyes. The dude that was studying them said that he tasted the blood himself, and he didn't think it was any different from normal blood. That blood really bothers canines though. Maybe it is something like that.


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## Woodbox (Jul 20, 2010)

likebugs said:


> I watched a show about the horned lizard that squirts blood from its eyes. The dude that was studying them said that he tasted the blood himself, and he didn't think it was any different from normal blood. That blood really bothers canines though. Maybe it is something like that.


I read that birds literally cant taste pepper. Their little tongues don't have the right receptors.


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## Schloaty (Aug 2, 2010)

> The few they can't eat they will know and drop.


Yep - I've noticed they'll drop and actually _spit out_ what they've bitten off of fireflies.

Too bad, as they're so easy to keep....and the idea of a glowing mantid is just too cool (I KNOW that wouldn't happen, but it's a great image).

Oh, well.


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## Woodbox (Aug 2, 2010)

Schloaty said:


> Yep - I've noticed they'll drop and actually _spit out_ what they've bitten off of fireflies.
> 
> Too bad, as they're so easy to keep....and the idea of a glowing mantid is just too cool (I KNOW that wouldn't happen, but it's a great image).
> 
> Oh, well.






http://mantidforum.n...h=1


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## LauraMG (Aug 2, 2010)

That......is......AWESOME!!!!!


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## PragmaticHominid (Oct 1, 2010)

Woodbox said:


> I read that birds literally cant taste pepper. Their little tongues don't have the right receptors.


Parrots can taste pepper. I don't know about other birds.


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