# Communal species???



## sk8erkho (Jan 18, 2007)

Although I am rather new to this. I have just had to put down an L2 who for no reason at all attacked a slightly larger female which he had been sharing a 5 gallon tank with for months now. I took them out to give them a chance to run around or whatever and as I was about to put them down the smaller male spotted her on my right forefinger, leaped to my chest, then to the right forearm and charged her. :shock: Needless to say, he paid for that impulsive maneuver with his life.  It was just one of those things. They had been sharing that tank since they were nymphs, actually, the last two of that particular ooth. And then one day Pow! It was all over. But, I did noticed that with all the extra room around them in that big tank there must be less opportunity for them to cross each other's paths or perhaps the spacial difference makes for a better environment, communially speaking. Who knows? :?

Khori


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## Rick (Jan 18, 2007)

Mantids will eat other mantids as we all know. If you keep them together you have to keep in mind it could happen, even if it's two mantids in a large enclosure.


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## Shelbycsx (Jan 19, 2007)

> Mantids will eat other mantids as we all know. If you keep them together you have to keep in mind it could happen, even if it's two mantids in a large enclosure.


As quoted from http://insectstore.com/blepharopsis.php?os...655754abcc08fbc

The Blepharopsis Mendica is an Empusid. There are a few different members of the Empusid family, including Idolomantis Diabolica and Empusa Sp. These can all be housed communally in theory, however, the if not given a constant food source, then this rule is broken.

This species can eat a lot! So it should be fed regularly, if not daily. A staple diet of live food items such as crickets, locusts, meal worms, Mario worms, wax worms, earth worms and any other live food that is readily available, will grown a healthy specimen. If fed a lot, the Blepharopsis can be housed communally. However, if you are in possession of only a few, then it is not worth the risk. There is always a possibility of cannibalism, no matter what species, and no matter how much food is provided.


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## Rick (Jan 19, 2007)

I just said that. Mantids eat each other whether someone says they can be kept together or not.


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## Sheldon Johnson (Jan 19, 2007)

First things first, dont let your anger take the best of you. Many times i have damaged tanks of bits of wall in anger as a female grabs a male during mating and bites through the neck before i can stop it. All i can say is that i felt worse for damaging the tank and not only loosing a mantis, but having to cover over the holes as well. Killing it for an action which should be expected from most species seems a little heartless and i will tell you what i tell myself every time i loose a mantis to canabalism; you only have yourself to blame, you know the risks and you chose to keep them like that. Even if theyre completely full, they can still try and eat more.

Anyway, enough of that. Sorry about your loss none the less, next time i would advise seperate tanks (if you are living in the UK, go to wilkinsons and by their plastic "fish tanks" @ £5 each, suits nearly all species - very useful and they stack 1 ontop of another) unless you are colonising a known "safe" species.

With idolos and blephs, i would refrain from trying it until one of the following occurs:

A. Someone writes a journal documenting the sucess and the method behind it.

B. You sucessfully breed them yourself and you have more than enough breeding stock, even then still keeping your breeding stock seperate.

C. They both become a common species, because experimenting with species that are few and far between is bad for your wallet, bad for the community and bad for the eco-system from where you are importing them.

My experience with both of these species, is that they have quite large appatites and i wouldnt risk putting them in a colony unless i had a lot of excess nymphs and the time to document it as there is very little out there.

As always i would sugest gongylus for a colony. You could try paradoxa, but there have been many mixed results with these. i.e. I colonised 40 L1 nymphs, fed them masses daily, but the after they moulted, the L2 nymphs would bite the L1 nymphs head off (territorial perhaps?) I seperated them, raised them to L4, then gave the remaining nymphs to Rob Byatt and he kept them colonised with no problems.

People have also claimed that deroplatys can be colonised with, which i also attempted (dessicata and lobata) neither of which was a sucess and i had to seperate after numerous losses.

Another species which needs further invesitgation into colonising are the sybilla sp. Whilst many people have implied that they can be colonised, very few have tried and i have found no documentation. However i will be attempting to colonise this species as soon as i have some excess ootheca hatch (waiting on about 15).

Anyway, i hope this helps. Im not trying to discourage colonisation, infact i think its fantastic and i find it to be far more interesting than keeping them individually, but it is near impossible in most species, so if you are going to do it, take care and record your actions as you may find sucess where others fail and we can all learn from each other.


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## wuwu (Jan 19, 2007)

i think the official definition for "communal species" should be: mantids who live peacefully together, provided that they are not starving. also, the fact that they might predate on a molting mantid should be ignored because ALL mantids wouldn't pass up on an easy meal.

sheldon, currently i'm keeping s. pretiosas and d. lobatas communally. i've found that s. pretiosas are not as communal as previously thought. i've lost several to predation on molting mantids but that's not the reason why i don't think they're that communal. it's the fact that they're always fighting with each other, giving each other threat displays. i only keep 3 - 4 nymphs per 32 oz. container so they have plenty of room, yet they're always bickering with each other. on the other hand, i've found that d. lobatas are pretty communal. i've only lost 2 to cannibalism, but only because they were starving. i ran out of food for a week during that period. i've never seen them fighting with each and they seem to enjoy just hanging out with each other. i used to keep 8 in a gallon container, but now i've put them two per 32 oz. container and they're L5/L6. i'm thinking of upgrading their homes to 3-4 per gallon container since they're getting pretty big now. i'm also keeping p. peruvianas communally. no losses yet. but i've only had them for a few weeks, so i'll see how it goes.


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## Sheldon Johnson (Jan 19, 2007)

Ok, thats interesting. Please try writting a weekly log of happenings in the colony, regarding feedings, canabalism, moults etc as i would love to read some of your findings.


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## Christian (Jan 20, 2007)

Hi.

I wrote somewhere before that I keep all my species communally, except some European ones (_Iris, Ameles_), and adult females of _Hierodula_ &amp; Co. I separate the genders in highly dimorphic species, though. But I usualy use huge terrariums with plants inside.

I only have a few losses, especially in older adult females of _Deroplatys_.

The rule is simple: if you have enough specimens, you can try breeding in groups. If not, keep them separately.

Regards,

Christian


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## sk8erkho (Jan 24, 2007)

Well, I found out for myself via lack of experience until I did the research that it is most unfortunate, but I lost many, many of my Chinese nymphs befoe the last one, to cannabalism. I would find the little bodies still standing there minus a head. So, with this ooth which hatched about two weeks ago they are all in separate tanks. Sometimes, like today I look at them and remember how they were very interesting to watch all together but the consequences of the excitement was far greater than the rewards of keeping them separate and knowing that they are intact and healthy. If it were not for the forum they would all be goners! Better safe than sorry! I was reeeeallly sorry! :wink:


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