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Hi. I would never use air travel, and never have as its an unnessessary major contributor to global warming. About time plane travel for the common herd was banned as it probably will be one day soon, when governments stop pandering to the brainless majority. Foreign holidays using air travel...

mostly found on the south coast, isle of wight etc. good places to look are sea cliffs in august when they become adults. you can hear the males singing along way off. worth searching for

looks like a speckled bush cricket. anyone caught a great green bush cricket. its uks biggest (and loudest!). quite predatory really, almost as like a mantis. they will take a chunk out of you if your not careful lol

is the leg the same length? ive seen them regenerate all the parts but the leg is usually very stubby and short at first

i put my female heirodula in with the male today to see what would happen; she only moulted a few days ago. he virtually ignored her. this fits in with her not producing a scent yet. it would be virtually impossible for mantids, being small and widely dispersed in thick vegetation to locate a...

pics not showing on mine. one pic did display yesteday. i get lots of blue question marks. im on a apple ibook with latest version of safari

Now, I know mantises often look quite tasty, I actually quite fancy eating one myself when i'm peckish, but I wonder if she knew the mantid probably had an abdomen full of mushed up blowflies, which had probably been eating dogsh!t or some rotting corpse somewhere :) Hmmm, maybe not so tasty...

i've seen photo's of groups of idolomantis sharing the same cage. i think they are Empusidae.

I doubt that the black widow is more dangerous to the mantis compared to other spiders as all spider venom is targeted at insects and is probably equally deadly to them. The black widow is only notorious because, by chance more than anything, its venom can be harmful to man. that spider looks...

i think i may have sussed why some people have observed them targeting the head area. The mantis presumably has sensors on its legs that can tell when the prey is not gripped properly, ie when the bigger part of it is flapping around and not properly secured. It would just have to compare...

wing buds 'lift up' and get fatter, and thorax looks fuller, and abdomen bobs back and forth, much more than usual. why do they do that; is it to suck in air into some sort of air sack to help them to push out of the skin? The abdomen is definitely bloated with air just after they moult...

Hi he's looks in a bad way but i'd keep him alive anyway, for the challenge if nothing else! What have you got to lose, as these mantids grow pretty fast so you won't have to look after it for long before the next moult.

hi. I've never seen it, at least in the ones i've kept. From what i've seen, at least half the time, they just start eating whichever part 'comes to hand' first, so can end up devouring the abdomen end first and the head end last, or the upperside or underside first, with the poor creature...

I just swopped a heirodula nymph with neil, which was the first deal for us both. Freindly bloke, and the mantis arrived quick, well packed, healthy and, er, green! I would definitely buy from again.

hi. last week i fed my sub sub adult heirodula nymph a queen wasp for a change due to there not being many bluebottles around. i'm amazed it took it due to its size and looks but it didnt hesitate to attack. The mantis stuggled for ages to bite through its tough thorax and it took at least 5...

shedding problems could be a sign of inbreeding in my opinion. ive had the same problem with some mantids. my evidence is having two lots of the same species of mantids from different breeders all living in the same partitioned cage and having the same diet; all are healthy for ages then one lot...

What is the maximum distance mantids can spot and stalk prey. My mantis cage is about 30cm tall and they (heirodula sp) seem able to spot & stalk prey over that distance if they have not been fed for a couple of days or so. I have not tested over greater distances but it would be interesting...

what species have you kept?

mine went from green to brown, about L3/4. I thought it was due to the surroundings. are you suggesting the change is genetic and if so can they go green again?

i reckon your right about the pheremones. those big antennae must do something. put them together :wink: i dont think they are that canabalistic if shes not ready to mate