Wild Tenodera sinensis hatch and a little oops

My Chinese mantis ooth hatched today. I almost didn't check in on it today but when I did the Little guys were everywhere. It's really exciting to see all of them crawling around after looking in at the empty tank for the last few weeks. I have them in a 10 gallon tank with a screen lid with chiffon sewn over it to cover the larger holes. Rough estimate I think there's around 150 or more. Wow O.O Not really sure how I'm going to keep all of them LOL.

Unfortunately I did not expect them to hatch so soon and had left my fruit fly culture in the tank. I had left the culture in the tank because the room they are in gets pretty cold at night, and the heat lamp really only warms the tank. I guess I didn't think about what I would do if they hatched while it was in there. Tomorrow I will probably try to get it out without letting all of them loose. Any ideas on the easiest way to do this?

I also have a Spider-Man-Mantis hanging from a thread in the picture below thread is left from when I sewed the chiffon on the screen.

Congrats! :clown:

LOL! "Spider-Man Mantis"

Definitely a keeper! x)

ZephyrStar said:

Unfortunately I did not expect them to hatch so soon and had left my fruit fly culture in the tank. I had left the culture in the tank because the room they are in gets pretty cold at night, and the heat lamp really only warms the tank. I guess I didn't think about what I would do if they hatched while it was in there. Tomorrow I will probably try to get it out without letting all of them loose. Any ideas on the easiest way to do this?

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First, congrats on the hatch.

Regarding not sure what to do with them all, the best thing I've found lately is to leave them housed together for the first few days. As many of the nymphs may not survive the first 2 to 3 days due to various reasons including birthing defects.

After that you can split them up to individual cups, small groups, or leave them all together. Many keepers will house them together until their numbers dwindle to a amount that can be handled - as it seems even with proper feeding there will be cannibalism.

So many are born as their chances for survival are slim. Typically only 15% to 25% of those nymphs are expected to survive past the first molt to L2; however, I imagine some keepers can increase those numbers with experienced care.

For housing search for nymph cups here on the forum you will find lots of ideas/plans to make them cheaply.

To get your fruit flies out of the tank, and the nymphs themselves when you are ready - the best thing I've found is to take the tank and place it into your bathtub (cover the drain and pull the shower curtains out of the tub first). Then you can open the lid and any escaping nymphs can be better handled as it will take them longer to get anywhere.

Best of luck.

That spidermantis is so adorable.

Chinese mantises are a lot of fun, such active springy little dears. At least you didn't have as bad as an oops I had one time when hatching out an ootheca of them. I was using an older cage that had a crack in the corner. Normally I used some paper towel to block it up. Well needless to say I forgot to stick the paper towel in and woke up to nymphs crawling all over the shelf and up my walls.

I was able to get the fruit flies out of the container last night. I rolled up the rug in my living room and opened the tank... Had my sister help catch runaways. The white tile made it easy to see any escapees. I fed a few of them although most didn't seem too interested in food....

This morning I checked on them and had about 8-9 dead ones. I'm hoping it was just nature taking its course... Only thing I could think of to cause it is that overnight it night have gotten a little colder than usual. Tank may have dropped as low as 60. It is usually 70-80. I need to get going on making nymph cups this weekend... Have only made a few so far...

I separated all of the nymphs into individual cups and containers today. I guess a high mortality rate is normal but it still was sad to see that out of 200 or so mantises, I now have 39 left alive. I think maybe the sand I use in the bottom of the tank was the issue (it was craft sand from hobby lobby that I already had) because only the ones that stayed on branches and the lid lived... But that could be just because they naturally don't like to be on the ground.

Here is a picture of all of the mantises containers. The boxes on the left are little storage boxes I found at hobby lobby that I modified. Feeding them took forever, but it helped having made the fruit fly baster that CosbyArt posted here: http://mantidforum.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=34847

ZephyrStar said:

I separated all of the nymphs into individual cups and containers today. I guess a high mortality rate is normal but it still was sad to see that out of 200 or so mantises, I now have 39 left alive. I think maybe the sand I use in the bottom of the tank was the issue (it was craft sand from hobby lobby that I already had) because only the ones that stayed on branches and the lid lived... But that could be just because they naturally don't like to be on the ground.

Here is a picture of all of the mantises containers. The boxes on the left are little storage boxes I found at hobby lobby that I modified. Feeding them took forever, but it helped having made the fruit fly baster that CosbyArt posted here: http://mantidforum.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=34847

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I've had several ooths hatch (5 now I think) and the mortality rate is never something I've gotten use to. It seems the more I try to keep them properly feed and misted the more deaths occur. Sadly I guess it is part of life no matter what care is given. Sounds like you are about the 20% mark in nymph success so you are doing fine.

The ones on the substrate could have very well fallen to it after their death from the lid or branches unnoticed. I've only witnessed a few still hanging from the lid dead, as they knocked off easily - and unless you are checking for movement/life is easily overlooked.

Glad you had luck getting them in their cups, as it can be a daunting task. Great, I'm happy you made the ff baster and it's working for you. Good news is, no matter what your feeding method, you will develop a feeding routine and it will get faster for you in time.