# Surprise treat for my mantis



## yen_saw

We had freeze and sleet last week but by Sunday we had a surprise "warm" weather at mid 70s. So I was hoping some flying insects may re-appear in my back yard. Sure enough, some bees were flying around the broccolli flower so without wasting more time, I caught a few for Nigerian flower and orchid mantis.



























They sure enjoyed it, now i really hope summer is here soon.


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## OGIGA

Nice photos. I'm just wondering, are there any insects that should not be fed to a mantis?


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## Rick

They know what they can and cannot eat. If it's not a suitable insect to eat they will drop it. Nice pics yen. I used bees this past summer as food.


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## yen_saw

Thanks guys, i would avoid feeding mantis any insect that has potential to attack or injure the mantis, like centipedes, tarantulas, assasin bugs, hornets, etc.


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## sk8erkho

Great pics, Yen! What camera do you use? Flash or floods?We just had snow here and frost also. So not much of a choice of treats around just yet!

Great!!

Khori


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## yen_saw

Thanks Khori, am using an old camera bought couple of years ago. Canon PowerShot SD500, i sould have used the money for a Macro lens instead.


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## Ian

Thinking about it, that is very early for bees Yen, I have never seen them out this early in the UK before!


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## yen_saw

Yup i am sure my mantis never thought of tasting wild caught bees this early! We have yo-yo type of weather in Houston, it could be as high as mid 60 this weekend so maybe more bees will show up again.

I was in UK 2001 for an offshore project and remember it was still below 5 deg C the day i reached Gatwick airport in mid July!


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## Ian

That's Gatwick for you  Yea, the UK weather isn't the most tropical of all.


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## AFK

> They know what they can and cannot eat. If it's not a suitable insect to eat they will drop it. Nice pics yen. I used bees this past summer as food.


what prey would they drop? i can only imagine a mantis dropping it once it realizes that its prey is harming it, e.g. a stinger penetrating the exoskeleton. do mantises drop bombardier beetles and blister beetles though? i heard they don't drop monarchs though.


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## jenner59

Ya I just caughta big fat black spider that I'd love to feed to my manits but i don't want to harm it.

It's a fairly small spider.


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## robo mantis

Ok i don't feed my mantids spiders but its worth a try as long as it is 1/3 the size of the mantis.


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## AFK

somebody do an experiment and feed a hierodula a tarantula hawk wasp :twisted:


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## yen_saw

> i can only imagine a mantis dropping it once it realizes that its prey is harming it, e.g. a stinger penetrating the exoskeleton. do mantises drop bombardier beetles and blister beetles though? i heard they don't drop monarchs though.


Yes, mantis will drop its food either because they are not hungary or the food itself is threatening/harming the mantis. Even a Katydid could force mantis to give up the food when put up a good fight. But mantis will attack anything smaller than their own size when hungary so they will still grab any potentially dangerous insects. The poison from Monarch butterfly doesn't seem to bother mantis.



> somebody do an experiment and feed a hierodula a tarantula hawk wasp


That's a horrible thing to do! But i know we are always amazed/curious with this sort of "experiment".


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## jplelito

Mantids can probably sense some prey-based chemicals, and they do seem to avoid ladybugs and ants by habit, before even capturing them most of the time. This would hint at a chemical sense. Other things will be dropped once they take a taste, and is probably driven by receptors in the palps around the mouth.

I feed bees without a problem, they seem to be pretty good at avoiding being stung anyhow. Mantids often sit on flowers outside so there's likely been selection to get them good at this ability. You'll want to avoid hornets though, becauses hornets can chew as well as sting!

As to the Monarch thing, oddly enough a lot of Monarchs are very low in alkaloid toxins, because some types of milkweed themselves are more potent than others. Some Monarchs are almost non-toxic, while others are probably pretty distasteful. It's also possible that the Monarch toxin doesn't bother the mantid, I suppose... it must work on birds well enough though!


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## Fisherman_Brazil

It's generally true to have them each they want!

According to my past experience, it will be a disaster to put somehting alein to them in the sense of nutrition and possible toxic.

I used to feed my Parsonii Parsonii with local batterfly and end up with a twosted spine. I would guess that is due to the poison problem that we are not awared of.

cheer Yen my friend

Luke


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## hibiscusmile

I do hope that was a yellow jacket or a paper wasp, only because the bees are dying off in an alarming number this year, researchers do not know why only that they are finding they have inside of them most diseases thay bees have had for the past 100 years! :shock:


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## humantis

On a related note...

Has anyone heard about the "bee crisis"? Apparently the drones are leaving the colonies and not returning and captive populations everywhere are just disappearing.

http://vegetablegardens.suite101.com/artic..._crisis_of_2007


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## hibiscusmile

Ues this is the crisis I was writing about. Hope they find out what it is before it is too late for the bees.


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