# Deroplatys lobata nymphs dying



## happy1892 (Jun 11, 2012)

Many of my Deroplatys lobata L1 nymphs have died. Most of them would not eat and get thin and die. A few died for some reason I do not know. I keep them around 80 degrees. I mist them every evening. I keep some moss for orchids in their container as a substrate. They are much easier to hand feed the L1 nymphs than the Carolina L1 nymphs but still hard and sometimes they will just not eat. I have a rough place for them to hang onto easily. I have 12 left and I do not want to lose anymore. I am trying to feed them Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies from outside and small grasshoppers from an area that I do not think has any poison.


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## agent A (Jun 11, 2012)

i think they r stressed out and dehydrated

give them more room, mist more often, and offer small prey, not giant baby grasshoppers lol


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## happy1892 (Jun 11, 2012)

agent A said:


> i think they r stressed out and dehydrated
> 
> give them more room, mist more often, and offer small prey, not giant baby grasshoppers lol


I will mist them more often! Thanks. I feed them fruit flies. They do not seem to be eating enough.


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## agent A (Jun 11, 2012)

maybe heat them up a tiny bit?


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## OctoberRainne (Jun 11, 2012)

I don't know if this will help with that particular species,but I like to avoid any substrate or anything extra with nymphs,and use really moist folded up paper towel lined on the bottom of what you have put them in,adds a bit more moisture and you can always re-spray it as needed along with them to keep up some more humidity. I think enough small food is probably the main factor though,definitely need the fruitflies if that small,as many as you can come by,or something equally as small as them. I hand feed nymphs a lot but I know that is not possible when you have a ton of them at once,so that is all I can offer if that helps any


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## maybon (Jun 11, 2012)

How exactly do you hand feed an L1 nymph? All of mine are way to small and skitish.


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## hibiscusmile (Jun 11, 2012)

they sometimes die off like that, I had a hatching the other day and they all died, I mist once in am and again at pm, feeding ffs and thinking it is I did not mist second time on time, all I can think of.


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## aNisip (Jun 12, 2012)

Mine are kept on the porch (in Florida) so temp is around mid-high 80's and at night high 70's and being in Florida it is always humid (+60%) I mist them every other day b/c of the high humidity. And they just recently all molted to L2's so I must be doing something right.  And they are each in their 32oz cup w/ fabric lid and dead leaves and sticks for camouflage.

Hope this helps,

Andrew


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## Domanating (Jun 12, 2012)

It's weird that all of you mention fruit flies as main food for young mantids. My mantis religiosa nymphs are just too small for a fruit fly. they would rather run away. The only decent food source i have for them are aphids.


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## agent A (Jun 12, 2012)

Domanating said:


> It's weird that all of you mention fruit flies as main food for young mantids. My mantis religiosa nymphs are just too small for a fruit fly. they would rather run away. The only decent food source i have for them are aphids.


mine ate both mels and hydei

they also cannabalized and r all dead but not from starving


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## Domanating (Jun 12, 2012)

I also had heavy losses. My mantis numbers in 5 days dropped from almost 200 to 31 today, lol. I still think there are too much and there are still 3 ooths yet to hatch....


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## aNisip (Jun 13, 2012)

For religiosa they need ALOT of room per nymph, they are extremely cannabalistic. But yeah, mine took very well to hydei and misting quite often helps too. If they still dont take ffs try some springtails!


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## agent A (Jun 13, 2012)

AndrewNisip said:


> For religiosa they need ALOT of room per nymph, they are extremely cannabalistic. But yeah, mine took very well to hydei and misting quite often helps too. If they still dont take ffs try some springtails!


u r not kidding, even with a 32oz deli cup per nymph they still had horrible mortality and misting twice a day wasnt enough


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## Domanating (Jun 13, 2012)

I'm glad they are dropping to reliable numbers or else it would be madness


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## happy1892 (Jun 13, 2012)

OctoberRainne said:


> I don't know if this will help with that particular species,but I like to avoid any substrate or anything extra with nymphs,and use really moist folded up paper towel lined on the bottom of what you have put them in,adds a bit more moisture and you can always re-spray it as needed along with them to keep up some more humidity. I think enough small food is probably the main factor though,definitely need the fruitflies if that small,as many as you can come by,or something equally as small as them. I hand feed nymphs a lot but I know that is not possible when you have a ton of them at once,so that is all I can offer if that helps any


They have many Drosophila melanogaster in their container and it was probably too many so I did not put anymore fruit flies in their containers and I let them calm down. All of the 12 are living and are plump now. I hand fed them. They are quite large, 15mm long. I actually panicked LOL! I misted them twice heavily using tap water that was not set out for a day and I think that is what killed the few plump ones.


agent A said:


> maybe heat them up a tiny bit?


It seems to be warm enough and it does get over 80 degrees now. Soon it will probably be about 98 degrees most of the summer and I do not think that will be too hot for them actually LOL! It rains about every day here! It really is a rain forest here hahahahaha! And that is perfect for these mantids right? I have another little problem now. My Blue Flash female does not eat. I stopped feeding her for two days. After the two days I got a roach to feed her and she seemed very interested and went after the roach and when the roach stopped and the female was right in front of the roach she kept doing a half strike. She would strike less than half way and pull back her front legs as if she grabbed the roach and she would do this over and over again very quickly. Then I tried to hand feed her and she did not seem to be able to hold on to the roach and her mandibles did not seem to be working right. She is very fat. Has this happened to anybody before?



agent A said:


> u r not kidding, even with a 32oz deli cup per nymph they still had horrible mortality and misting twice a day wasnt enough


I guess that was too much for European Mantids. To much misting I guess would make them mismolt. I seem to have misted my Stagmomantis carolina nymphs too much and all of them mismolted.



maybon said:


> How exactly do you hand feed an L1 nymph? All of mine are way to small and skitish.


These L1 Deroplatys lobata nymphs can be hand fed but still a little hard. Other L1 nymphs of a different species seem to be impossible to hand feed. You first explode a roach's or a cricket's or a moth's belly and the juice comes out then put it in front of the mantis's mouth carefully.


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## OctoberRainne (Jun 13, 2012)

Glad to hear,hope they continue to be plump little cuties!


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## Domanating (Jun 14, 2012)

happy1892 said:


> These L1 Deroplatys lobata nymphs can be hand fed but still a little hard. Other L1 nymphs of a different species seem to be impossible to hand feed. You first explode a roach's or a cricket's or a moth's belly and the juice comes out then put it in front of the mantis's mouth carefully.


With a bit of patience and steady hands you can get there. In this case i took off the head of a fruit fly and it gave to a deformed new born mantis religiosa. It is unable to to hunt or move well but it survived 6 days without a single meal. Among its brothers i thought that like many others it would sucumb to canibalism, twisted interiors or hunger. As a survivor i guess he deserves more attention.


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## hibiscusmile (Jun 14, 2012)

That is so sweet! oh sorry, men dont wannta be sweet! that is so cool!


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## maybon (Jun 16, 2012)

Very cool I will have to try and do this sometime.


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