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I agree. I always move my subadult female orchids from a deli cup to a 8x8x12 inch terrarium well before her final molt. A deli cup isn't big enough to accommodate a female's last molt, it increases the risk of a mismolt signifcantly. She needs a bare minimum of 6x6x9 inches of free space (not...

For a subadult female orchid a deli cup is just barely big enough but you'll have to move her to something bigger before she molts to adult. A female subadult molting to adult pretty much doubles in size and her final molt would be on the cramped side.

"Room temperature" is subjective and can encompass a wide range in temperatures. One person may think 65°F is room temperature while someone else may think 85°F is. For me 76°-78°F is what I consider room temperature to be. The main thermostat in my house is set to 78°F, which is a suitable...

Absolutely! I wish I could upvote this comment 5 more times. Having a constantly wet environment is really bad for orchids, it makes the air inside their enclosure stagnant so you have to have really good ventilation. You want a dry environment most of the time but at the same time still have...

Yes, ventilation is super important for orchids. Poor ventilation is usually the cause of most problems with low ambient humidity second, especially for molting issues. However, you also don't want the environment to be dripping wet all the time either which is why ventilation is so important...

Oh wow still? Have you tried offering him some food? If he hasn't eaten in all that time and keeps at it much longer, he may actually boink himself to death, lol. Males can go quite a while without food but there is a limit. Try offering him a fly with tweezers or feeding tongs.  If he still...

Yeah, besides "weird bug lady" another group of friends straight out refers to me as "their praying mantis" 

I talk to my mantises too, when they jump off my arm I'll ask them where they think they are going or when they make a particularly spectacular catch of a fly out of the air I'll congratulate them on their dexterity. Or when one is having trouble catching prey I'll tell them to keep at it...

Yes, I was thinking it was caused either by exhaustion or extreme stress or maybe she was extremely deficient in important nutrients after molting. The fact that food snapped her out of it made me think of people who are hypoglycemic and get a tremor/shakiness until they get some sugars in their...

The same thing happened to one of my thistles. The wings will stay like that permanently but don't worry they can still live a fairly normal life. He's fine otherwise. Like you I had to move him to a bigger enclosure to accommodate his new stature.

While insects do not feel emotions like humans do and we definitely tend to anthropomorphize their actions mantises are very intelligent for insects. Mine are able to distinguish between me and a new person and will flatten themselves out against my hand to "hide" if they think the new person...

Oh yes thistles are especially bad about that. I had one female nymph that would watch everything going on outside her deli cup and she would strike the side of the cup at any shadow or perceived movement near her. I would hear her striking at the plastic every 5 minutes for hours on end until I...

One of my females would also do circular motions with her arms a little like she was doing a hula dance when she was calling but she was the only one out of several females to do that. When they call they are releasing pheromones from their abdomen to tell males they are ready to mate. They'll...

Good to hear it got through the molt perfectly! Me too. Hopefully she doesn't fall in the process. I think she fell with this last molt when she was already mostly dry but landed in a position that caused her joint problems. She was on the bottom of her enclosure when I found her barely hanging...

I have one female and two males. One male is pictured and the other is still L5. The female just molted last night and has one more molt to go to become an adult. Now I've had two minor mismolts out of two, at least nothing truly debilitating happened to them. Good luck with yours, hopefully...

My female thistle dried badly too but not so much that it's super debilitating, she isn't an adult yet so hopefully her next molt fixes the problem. Her left raptorial arm came out wonky so she can't bend it inward to the praying position, it stays permanently splayed outward. She can use it to...

As long as he's on her back leave him to it, he'll probably figure it out eventually. I've gotten nymphs from pairings where the male stayed connected for several days straight but also from pairings where the male did lots of short connections that only lasted 10 to 20 minutes each. He can go...

He is cool looking isn't he. Who knows why he didn't try to fold his wings, maybe he was just too exhausted from the molt to be bothered, his wings just stayed in the position gravity put them in. At least he's got a good appetite and seems fine otherwise. He was the first of my thistles to...

My thistle mantis molted last night to adulthood and the wings dried in this position, they cannot be folded down. Otherwise the mantis is fine and suffers no disability (other than not being able to fly.) 

Cool 😊