# 10 oz Mantis home for beginners.



## Mr.Mantid (May 16, 2010)

Here is my little home I made for them:







Its a pretty simple home to make. All you need is some clear plastic cups ( I used 10 oz cups ) rubber bands, cheese cloth, cotten balls, twigs, excelsior (optional) and a small humidity sponge (optional). With the exception to the humidity sponge and excelsior, you can pretty much find everything at the Wal*Marts.

I began by cutting a small hole near the bottom. The hole is big enough to let your pinky slip in, it doesnt really need to be that big its just a hole for water and feeder insects. Next put some twigs in. I used excelsior instead but twigs work fine for the little guys to climb on. It also makes it easier for feeder insects to climb up. Dont put too much in, the mantes should have plenty of air to breath. Then, cover the top with some cheese cloth and rubber band it on so that it stays nice and snug on there. You'll then want to cut a cotton ball in half; you'll be using one half of a cotton ball to plug up the hole. Thats it! pretty simple set up. You can put the mantes in either before or after you set up the cheese cloth, but I prefer to do it after, through the small hole, because the mantids like to climb all over the place.






I have 5 nymphs per cage but some will probably end up in their siblings stomachs. The first night in these homes, i had one mantis in 3 out of four cages with their butts chewed off and that was with feeding them a bunch of fruit flys earlier that day.

Hope this helps.

Cheers! =D

Mr. Mantid


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## hibiscusmile (May 16, 2010)

Looks good, make sure they have molting room for their little heads!


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## Mr.Mantid (May 17, 2010)

hibiscusmile said:


> Looks good, make sure they have molting room for their little heads!


That might not be a problem, they keep eating eachother!


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## ismart (May 19, 2010)

Mr.Mantid said:


> That might not be a problem, they keep eating eachother!


Depending on how many your looking to keep? Now might be a good time to start seperating them?


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## Mr.Mantid (May 19, 2010)

ismart said:


> Depending on how many your looking to keep? Now might be a good time to start seperating them?


only 5, hence only 5 containers, I figured they'd eat eachother but i didn't know they ate eachother that fast. ha ha.


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## Montisa (May 20, 2010)

Cool Container's. For my nymphs, I just use a small fish tank. Same for Adults. Just a bigger fish tank.


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## Mr.Mantid (May 20, 2010)

Montisa said:


> Cool Container's. For my nymphs, I just use a small fish tank. Same for Adults. Just a bigger fish tank.


Thanks ^_^ . Yeah these tanks are a bit too small for housing multiple mantis' but perfect for living alone. Amenities include: excelsior, free water, free food. and the internets. With such a small area to explore, they like to munch on eachother I just didn't figure it would be so quick! last week I had 25 mantises but now i am down to 11. I want to keep around 5 to 8 of them so looks like tomorrow morning I will be making more! ^_^ 



> Looks good, make sure they have molting room for their little heads!


Is excelsior good for L1 molts?


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## ismart (May 21, 2010)

Is excelsior good for L1 molts?

Excelsior is fine for molting L1 nymphs.


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## Mr.Mantid (May 24, 2010)

ismart said:


> Is excelsior good for L1 molts?


Excelsior is fine for molting L1 nymphs.

yay.

t'anks


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## sandisk73 (Jan 3, 2011)

> Its a pretty simple home to make. All you need is some clear plastic cups ( I used 10 oz cups ) rubber bands, cheese cloth, cotten balls, twigs, excelsior (optional) and a small humidity spong (optional). With the exception to the humidity spong and excelsior, you can pretty much find everything at the Wal*Marts.


Excuse me if i re-open this discussion, but im curious about *small humidity spong*. What is this? And wich materials you used for the spong? The word "spong" is a mistery for me.


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## Rick (Jan 3, 2011)

Sandisk73 said:


> Excuse me if i re-open this discussion, but im curious about *small humidity spong*. What is this? And wich materials you used for the spong? The word "spong" is a mistery for me.


It is sponge, not spong. They are mostly used for cleaning. I experimented with using sponges but did not like it. The enclosures built are basically the same thing many of us have been doing for years with the good ole 32 oz insect cups which come with nice lids.


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## PhilinYuma (Jan 3, 2011)

Rick said:


> It is sponge, not spong. They are mostly used for cleaning. I experimented with using sponges but did not like it. The enclosures built are basically the same thing many of us have been doing for years with the good ole 32 oz insect cups which come with nice lids.


Yeah. The "humidity sponge" is a circle of plastic sponge placed in the bottom of a plastic enclosure.. The name is used by "MantisPlace", Hibiscusmile's website. The advantage is that it holds more water than paper towels placed on the bottom of the cup; the disadvantage is that it absorbs water much more slowly, and if you spray a lot of water into the pot, it will sit on top of the "humidity sponge" where it might drown very young nymphs. I use it regularly, but you need to be aware of the possible problem.


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## hibiscusmile (Jan 3, 2011)

Yea, like he said!


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## sandisk73 (Jan 3, 2011)

PhilinYuma said:


> Yeah. The "humidity sponge" is a circle of plastic sponge placed in the bottom of a plastic enclosure.. The name is used by "MantisPlace", Hibiscusmile's website. The advantage is that it holds more water than paper towels placed on the bottom of the cup; the disadvantage is that it absorbs water much more slowly, and if you spray a lot of water into the pot, it will sit on top of the "humidity sponge" where it might drown very young nymphs. I use it regularly, but you need to be aware of the possible problem.


Thanks for the answer!


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## weathmatth (Jan 25, 2011)

Pretty cool little homes, say yoour only keeping one, how long till you will have to move it to a larger home?


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## Mr.Mantid (Jan 30, 2011)

I forget, i made these a little less than a year ago, but I think it was around l3 or l4, the main thing is to pay attention to their size in relation to their enclosure.


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## weathmatth (Jan 31, 2011)

Cheers.


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