# Awesome Idolomantis shots



## guapoalto049 (Mar 3, 2011)

I took a few shots on the scope of an Idolo foreleg. I could have gone higher mag but you can't really tell what you're looking at @ 18,000 X!

Tarsus:







Tibia:






More tib:






Closer tibia:






Femur:






Apical hook:


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 3, 2011)

MORE SHOTS

Femoral interspinal hairs?






I'd hate to be a fly:











Surface of the moon? Idolo hair?






Cool surface:


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## Mex_Ghost (Mar 3, 2011)

:blink: :blink: :blink: 

with out words!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## hibiscusmile (Mar 3, 2011)

Ditto, I agree, wild b &amp; w shots, great looking!


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## cuervo (Mar 3, 2011)

Amazing shots  They look like giant teeth,love the broken ones


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 3, 2011)

Thanks everyone!

They're actually gold coated, unfortunately electron microscopes don't take color pics!


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## infinite213 (Mar 3, 2011)

Awesome, must have set you back a good $150,000 for that scope.


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 4, 2011)

Haha set the school back, apparently its around $310,000. I'm not sure if that includes the machine that gold coats the specimen.

The process of coating with gold is almost as cool as the sample itself. Its a gas flow sputter coater that has a mist of gold slowly coat the forearm. There is a purpleish haze in the tank which is awesome to see.


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## sporeworld (Mar 4, 2011)

(wow)


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## angelofdeathzz (Mar 4, 2011)

amazing shots, is that mantis alive? if it's coated in gold I guess not???


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## dgerndt (Mar 4, 2011)

WOAH. Intensely amazing pictures. It's so odd to see mantids' hairs, because you really can't see them when you're just holding one or looking through a plastic container.


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 4, 2011)

@angelofdeathzz: I had a female subadult Idolo eat one of her sisters, two days after a clean molt. She left one of the forelegs so I saved it for imaging. I think I'm going to try and get some forearm shots of other species, or if anyone really wants me to take one of their sample I'd be more than glad to run it!


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## angelofdeathzz (Mar 4, 2011)

Oh man that sucks, some people keep saying how non-aggressive they are, I don't see it? mine will knock each other into next week if I try to keep them together. not like the almost playful boxing my violins do, I'm talking death blows or like yours the munch down.

Everyone that has had Idolos knows the the pain of premature death from one thing or another. there a wicked species just not lucky.

I'll guess they fought over a fly one caught and then it got ugly...

But hey now you got a cool piece of bling you can wear around if you want.(Ha-Ha)


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 4, 2011)

Yeah I think it was a fight over a fly. They eat roaches straight from the tweezers too, unlike the violins. I would have been really really upset if she ate a male, but alas I had no male to lose.

Haha yeah mantis bling, thats what all the celebs are wearing these days!


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## animalexplorer (Mar 4, 2011)

Really cool images! One of my L7 female diabolicas takes flies right out of my fingers everytime. There strength is pretty impressive. I've had her hold onto my fingers while she eats, She thinks I'm a big bug, and tugs my finger in closer, she bit me a couple of times although it doesn't hurt.


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## Slinkytreekreeper (Mar 5, 2011)

The spiral grooving on the spikes is stunning, thanks for posting man, they are fantastically revealing. How about a compound eye, would that still come out with this technique?

How does the magnification system change from camera to microscope then? If I could get there yet then about 10-15x magnification on a DSLR would get that close/fov, is this something to do with the focal distance?

More!


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 7, 2011)

Yeah compound eyes turn out really neat, I don't have any mantid heads to put in there though.

The camera is built in to the microscope and goes directly to a computer, so it just depends on the magnification of the machine. You can change the focal length to get the best resolution at higher mags. I looked around for about three hours, but these shots showed the most interesting things.

I also looked at my shield mantis ooth that never hatched. I couldn't find anything worth photographing so I just tossed the sample.


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## Mex_Ghost (Mar 7, 2011)

I would like to see adult male anthennas at that magnification!!!  

saludos


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## Arwen9 (Mar 7, 2011)

Nice pics. B)


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## yen_saw (Mar 8, 2011)

Great photo! Good instrument for mantis genitalia study.


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 9, 2011)

If I had an adult male I'd def put him on there when he passed away!

@Yen: This would be a great tool for that, unfortunately I know nothing about mantid genitalia haha. That would be a neat topic however, as I have a few preserved female specimens that I could take a look at.


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## animalexplorer (Mar 20, 2011)

I was thinking it would be a great if one could actually get high magnification images of tarsal claws clinging to a surfaces so one can get ideas of their preferences on branch selection and a more clearer perspective on their clinging ability. Even images of the molted skin of the tarsal area. Next time if your real careful you could cut above the molted tarsal where it is still attached to the surface and take it in to scan it? With an image like that, we could make better selections of branches with the perfect optimized porus surface possibly?


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## guapoalto049 (Mar 20, 2011)

That's a great idea! I did take one of the mantid's tarsus for that purpose, as you can see in the picture it has a very under-developed pulvillus (sticky pad). In the non-Empusidae families of mantids (especially the Rhombodera genus in my observation), you see more pronounced pulvilli for climbing smooth surfaces.

In my opinion, the Empusidae lost the need for pulvilli over time and species that put them to use (those spp clinging to leaves) developed larger ones.

I believe that bark, sticks, and any time of stemmed organic matter will be the best thing for Idolomantis. They don't live on nets in the wild, so I don't know why people would put such a notoriously difficult species in an unnatural environment.

I do have the skin from the Idolo, I'll give it a try this week in the SEM!


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## Precarious (Mar 21, 2011)

OMG! I need an electron microscope!!! Too cool.

Look at those serrated threads winding around the spikes on the claws! Wow...

I have some corpses I can send you if you want.


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